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ANDARD PERSONAL COMPUTING 


$2.95/3.95 CANADA* FOREIGN 



Editorial 

LIBRARY 


U86 02391 


BEGINNING THIS ISSUE! 
JOHN DVORAK’S 
INSIDE TRACK 


NUMBER 14 


PC Labs 
Tests 12 
Enhanced 
Graphics 
Adapters 


Business Forecasting: 
16 Ways to 
Predict the Future 

Project Database: 

18 Flat-File Choices 

Programming I 
Column: The EGA i 
Secrets IBM 
Never Told You ^ 





News from Borland Intemationall Vol. 2 No. 1 





INSIDE STORIES! 

□ Maybe no one bul your mother knows you can't speii. but go on-line with 
CompuServe. MCI. The Sot^ce and others, and ihe wtwie world knowsi So use 
Turbo Lightning to save you from public electronic embarrassment Lightning checks 
your spelling on-line, as you type, and betore the word gets out See inside pages 
tor more 

□ Just released, new addition to Turbo Lightning Called the Lightning Word 
Wizard. It's both a technical relerence manual lor the 'engine ' that drives Turbo 
Lightning, and a crossword-solving, rrund-bending. mystery-makmg. code-cracking 
set ot word challenges— and you don't need to be a programmer to play 


Wi 


eflrequently 
surprise people 
with inventive, 
unagina.tive software, and 
people frequently surprise 
us with the way theyuse it 
For example, you’ll 
read on this page about 
how a Callfomla soaring 
club uses our Reflex: The 
Analyst" to give their 
pilots weather and 
thermal predictions and 
charts and graphs eveiy weekend. 

That’s an apphcaUon we didn’t imagine when 
we released Reflex as a highly visual anAlytical 
database manager and report writer. 

But it’s the kind of qye-opening application 
that might stimulate fresh ideas in mind 
about how you can put your Reflex: The Analyst 
to work for you. 

And thank you for your interest in and 
support for Borland International. 




Philippe Kahn , 

President, Borland International 


Reflex: The Analyst 
and the Wild Blue Yonder! 


Andrew J. Pizlall wrote 
us, “I have been using Reflex 
for several months now for 
both home budgeting and, 
would you believe, SOARING 
PORECASTSI 

This soaring forecast is 
uploaded to the local hang 
gliding bulletin board each 
Saturday and Sunday 
morning. Prior to using 
Reflex, the raw data was 
plotted on a weather chart 
with a plastic overlay, This 
(new) system is much easier 
to use and I can manipulate 
the gr^ih scales and hypo- 
theste soaring conditions 
under changing variables.” 

He sent us Reflex graphs 
showing “Thermal Index vs. 
Altitude” and “Temperature 
va Altitude” (both shown 
here), along with Reflex- 
generated reports showing 


inversions, wind direction, 
knot speeds at varying 
altitudes, and top of 
convection stats. All the 

Ihprnil IndPi iK. Altitude 


criteria pilots need to know 
and need to see before they 
fly, because most of them 
know the flying maxim, 
“There are old pilots and 
bold pilots, but there are no 
old bold pilots.” 

Another novel use 
for Reflex, the greatest 
analytical tool since the 
couchl 


LATC N£WSI TANDY NOW EVEN MORE HANDY! 

D Borlanb iniernabofial and Tandy Corporation have reached a new agreement 
which gives you about 5.500 more places worldwide to buy Borland products 
Through Tandy's ‘Express Deltvery" program, yoj can now order Borland products 
Irom any Tant^ catalog m any Tandy store and get two-day delivery in the U S 


TOSHIBA PICKS SIDEKICK AND SUPERKEY! 

□ Borland Irriernaiional ^d Toshiba America. Inc have announced a loint marketing 
arrangement m which Toshiba will bundle Borland's SideKick ^d SuperKey 
programs on their new Toshiba 3100 portable, and SideKick on their new TilOO 
PLUS portable corr^ters The new Toshiba models and Borland's sottware 
programs are IBM PC-compalible 


CIRCLE 138 ON READER SERVICE CARD 











BeOar 


Why ruimiiig your business without 
Borland’s Reflex and the new Reflex 
Workshop is an act of blind faith 


Running a successful 
business Isn’t something 
you can do with your eyes 
shut, but no matter what 
business you’re in, Reflex’” 
and the new Reflex 
Workshop" give you all 
the tools and views to see 
what all the numbers 
look like. 

UalDg Lotus ordBASF 
wttiwutSeQeiiBllkBdrtTiBg 
stoigbtwitiM,h^bt8 

such aa 1-^ cr dBASE 
can do the numbers Ibr/xi, but^ 
may still not ^ the picture— slm;^ 
because they can't showyDu 
anajyucal graphs and pk}tureB of 
TTur data, nor can they anah’ze and 
summarize all the infcniiation jcu 
man^xilate Him ReHex caa 


biyies of HAU, 32,000 re(XH<de, and 
2^ flelda per reocrt with ihe DOW- 
legendaiy “ReOw Ughining Speed." 

PurthOTnore, Reflex 1.1 with 
Its EQA siqipon di^d^ 40 Hnee 


st;^ List compared to lees 
than 26 lines dlQilaysd by 
traditional ^ireadeheeta 

Uinlmum memoiy 3 d 4 K 


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PFS FILE, and oVw 
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J _ Turbo Pascal lvCP/U-80 
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Ifyouelm^bougbtBeOax 
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Beosuaejeu bou^t Reflex from 
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Since we're net, the ‘"takethe-nkxiey^ 
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fv C wW i Worktlnp 


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tha Atfiar Vbrkshcp ihr ctzi^ I 
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Sedd eeparately, the new Reflex 
Wo^ohep Is 169^6 and Reflex is 
114056, totaling ♦21950-but you 
can get th^ both fbr a limited time 
only, at an amazing II9956. So act 
now, rush to your n^reet dealer, call 
us, or cl^ the cot4»n and pul Reflex 
1.1 and the Reflex Workahop to wex^ 
fixyoun^iawayt 


(14995‘ S- 
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99 95 J_ 

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Only $69.95 

^nroraaUionbMexihenew/^ 
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For FlitaocoiAccouotiBg: 

• ft««ess fj 5 >Mse Tracking 

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Analysts 

• Purchase Ober £niry I Analys/s 

• Piatfiase Order Trxkaig System 

• Leasatg atmeory Umge^ 


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• Ca^ Managvnem Trial BWance 

• Commercial Real Estaa Tracking i 
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• Sales lead Tiackaig i Analysis 

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Ttackaig 

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• Produa Cost Analysis ana Conm 


■ Sioertfff/ 6995 

■ CbfsM USA add StO pet copy 
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I Amouni enclosed 

I Prices include stappatg to ad US dbes. 

I Car^ deserbe your corripuiBi syaem 
I Mneit ^8-ta _f 6 -W 
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! My coqMAr's name and model is. 


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^Payrrm VISA MC Moneyorder Check 
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B Borland OMsaJet^irake payment by bar* drad 

■ payable at US doaars drawn an a US bar* 

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SCOTTSVAUlr.CA 95066 

INTIRNATIONAI (408)438-8400 T[L£X IT2373 





Enally, a langui^e worth 


For years BASIC has been everyone’s first 
language. And for almost as long, they’ve been 
tempted by other languages. Lured by promises 
of mote speed, more power. 

We have a solution. A new language that’s a 
substantial, improvement over BASICA. Faster. 
More structure. Finally, a cxjmpelling reason to 
leave BASIC. 

Introducing Microsoft’s QuickBASIC 
Compiler, Version 2.0. 

At last, you can have the latest programming 
techniques, combined with the solid foundation 
of BASIC. Our new compiler is as compatible 
with BASICA as you can get. At the same time 
it offers the extra speed and power you’ve been 
looking for. 


Run hister with compiled code. 

If there’s one thing you’ve asked for, it’s speed. 
And Microsoft* QuicteASIC simply blaz^. 
Old BASICA programs will run up to ten times 
quicker once they’ve been compiled. Sometimes 
even faster. 

Everything you need. Built-in. 

Making programs run ftister is only part of the 
story, though. The new Microsoft QuickBASIC 
Compiler includes a full-screen editor, built-in. 
So now you can make the jump from writing to 
RUNning in no time flat. Edit your program, 
compile it, and run it. Faster than any other 
BASIC compiler around. All without leavii^ 
our on-line help and prompts. 



= File Edit View 


Next Error F6 


Find... 

Selected Text ^ 
FOR theta = 0 TO 2* Repeat Last Find F3 

COLL DrawStarfc Change . . . 


NEXT titeta 


Ubel 


SUB DrauS tar (cx,cy, radius, theta) STATIC 
dx = radius • cos (theta) 
dy = radius * sin (theta) 
line(cx,cy)-(cx+dx,cy+dy),2 
end sub 


Next Error 


NEXT uithout FOR 




leaving BASIC for. 


On the rare chance your program doesn’t run 
100% the first time out, we’ve got another sur- 
prise for you. The Microsoft QuickBASIC 
debugger. Our full-screen tradtrg lets you debug 
your programs while watching me source code 
execute. A line at a time, or with breakpoints. 
As easy as can be. 

Our compiler is also smart enough to save you 
time. First, by finding any errors in one pass. 
Second, by putting your editor’s cursor on the 

E roblem. Automatically. So you don’t have to get 
)st in a maze of error codes and line-numbers. 

The BASIC virtues. And more. 

Speaking of line numbers, let’s not. Because 
line numbers are strictly optiorral. And Microsoft 
QuickBASIC lets you use alphanumeric labels 
as well. Now you can GOTO ErrorCheck instead 
of line number 6815. 

Or you could stop using GOTOs altc»ether. 
There are a variety of optiotrs that could make 
the GOTO an endangered species. Features like 
multi-line IF-THEN blocks. And named sub- 
programs. Now your BASIC programs can be 
as structured and organized as you want. 

We’ve only just begun to talk about the 
virtues of Microsoft QuickBASIC. There are 
dozens of enhancements to your favorite 
lan^age. Things like larger arrays. Local and 
global variables. Reusable modules that let you 
create libraries of your most often-used routines. 
All explained in a revised manual that includes 
a complete language reference. 

Making your quick escape. 

If all these features follow your BASIC 
instincts, then zip on down to your nearest 
Microsoft dealer. That’s where you’ll discover the 
best surprise of all. The price. Only $99 for the 
best reason to leave BASIC. 

For the name of your nearest Microsoft dealer, 
call (800) 426-9400. In Washington State and 
Alaska, (206) 882-8088. In Canada, call (416) 
673-7638. 

Microsoft® QuickBASIC 

The High Fferformance Software'" 



Microsoft QuickBASIC Compiler Version 2.0 
ft)r ffiM*PC and Compatible Computers. 

BASICA Compatibility 

♦ Sound statements including SOUND and PL^ 

♦Graphics statements irw^uding WINEXDW VIEW DRAW 

GET. PUT. UNE, CIRCLE. LOCATE and SCREEN. 

♦ Support of EGA exuded graphics modes. NEW! 

♦ BASICA structures are supported including WHILEAVEND. 

IF/THEN/ELSE, FOR/NEXT GOSUB/RETURN. and 
event handling. . , 

Microsoft 

Results of Sieve Benchmark BASICA 3.1 QuickBASIC 2.0 
Seconds per iteration 78 0.S2 

Complete Programming Environment 
♦Built'in Editor that places die cursor on found errors autcy 
matically. NEW! 

♦ Compile entirely in memory at speeds up to 6000 lines per 
minure. NEW! 

♦ Link routines once when starting a programmii^ session and 
no need to link again when changing programs. NEW! 

♦ Built'in debugger with sin^e^step, animate, and trace modes. 

NEW! 

♦Create stand-alcxie programs. 

Alphanumeric Lalreb 

♦ C^n be used to make your programs more readable. Line 
numbers are not required but are supported for BASICA 
compatibility 

Structured Programming Support 

♦ Block IF/THEN/ELSE/END IF eliminates the need for 
GOTO statements. NEW! 

♦ Subprograms can be called by name and passed parameters. 
Bodi k>^ and gbbal variable are supported. 

Modular Programming Support 

♦ Separate compilation allows you to create compiled BASIC 
libraries to use and rc'use your programs. 

♦A library of routines to access E)OS and BIOS interrupts is 
supplied. NEW! 

Large Program Support 
♦Ccxie can use up to available memory. 

♦Numeric arrays, each up ® 64K bytes, 
can use up te available memory. 

NEW! 


Micraaoft is s regisiered (radecnark and The Ki^ Performance Software b a trademark of 
Mkroaofi Corporation. IBM b a registeTed trademark of IntetTMcioctal BuiineM Machinea Corporatioa 


CopyWrite 

BACKS UP 
IBM PC 
SOFTWARE 

Hundreds of the most 
popular copy-protected 
programs are copied readily. 
CopyWrite needs no 
complicated parameters. 

It needs an IBM Personal 
Computer, or an XT or an AT, 
128k bytes of memory, and 
one diskette drive. 

CopyWrite wilt run faster 
with more memory or 
another drive. 

CopyWrite is revised 
monthly to keep up with the 
latest in copy-protection. 

Ybu may get a new edition at 
any time for a $15 trade 
in fee. 

CopyWrite makes back up 
copies to protect you 
against accidentat loss of 
your software, 't is not for 
producing copies for sate or 
trade, or for any other use 
that deprives the author of 
payment for his work. 

To order CopyWrite, send a 
check for $50 U.S. , or call us 
with your credit card. We will 
ship the software within 
a day. 



Quaid Software Umited 

45 Charles Street East 
Third Floor 

Toronto. Ontario M4Y 1S2 

(416) 961*8243 

Ask about ZeroOisk to run copy-protected 
software from a hard disk without floppies. 



EXECUTlVfcEDtTC«S 


...Bany Owen. Paul Somenam 


WEST COAST EDITOR 

SPECIAL PROJECTS EDHOR 

SENIOR EOnXM 

TECHNICAL EDITOR 

MANAGING EDITORS 

MANAGER. COPY EDIT 

ASSOCIATE EDITORS 

STAFF EDITOR 

SENIOR COPY EDITOR 

PRODUCTION EorroR 

ASSISTAhfT EDITORS 

COORDINATING EDITOR 

SENIOR EDITORIAL ASSISTANT 
EDITORIAL ASSISTANTS 

BUSINESS MANAGER 

PROOFREADER 

CONTRIBUTI.NG EDITORS 


ASSISTANT TO THE PUBLISHER 


.. ...Sicwail Abup 
. . John Dickinson ^ 

, ,, BinHfWParr " 

CfligL. Stark 

.... Luisa Simone. GusVendinu 
. Luula Louk 

. ^-Charks Bcrmant. Jennifer de Jong. Lisa KJeinman. BarbaraKfasDuff 
Goldberg 

(jalwHfwir 

Paul B. Ross 

. VictonaDanoff.CaroleGuldsiein.ChrisiopheTJohnstofl. AtmOvodow, 
^1 M. StafToni 
. Gieg Pasmek 
M Stephanie Ricks 

. .. David Baker. ChnsiinaDyar.ChnstinaCBiang 

Ills Knitiel 

Michael Cohn 

Richard Aanms. Frank J. Derfler. Jr., John C. Dvorak. Glenn H«t. 

Sieve Hoizner. James Langdeli, Stephen Manes. Peter Nonon. Charles 
PetzoU. Wim L.Rosch. Jim Seymour. Jared T^lor 
Careyl^CIwie 


SFJ^K» ART DIRECTOR 

TECHNICAL ART DIRECTOR . . 
ASSOCIATE ART DIRECTOR . 

ART EDITOR 

ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR ... 

LAYOUT ARTISTS 

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT 


Maiy Zisk 
Gerard Kunkel 
. llissa Goodheart 
Mariano Nicieza 
Denise Plaikm 
Natalie Chu. Susan McGuire 
.Frieda T. Smallwood 


DIRECTOR. PC LABS William C Woc« 

PRODUCT TESTING EDITOR MkMOICona 

TECHNICIAN Charles Rodnguez 


MARKETING DIRECTOR Ronni Simneiibetg 


PUBLIC RELATIONS MANAGER Jessica Kersey 

PUBLIC RELATIONS ASSISTANT Kinkerly Humphries 


SINGLE COPY SALES DIRECTS Bob Wohersdorf 

aRCULATION MANAGER Charles Mast 

CIRCULATION COORDINATOR RobenSmaW 


SENiORAD PRODUCTION MANAGERS Susan DePieiro. Wendy Gokbieifi 

AD. PRODUCTION ASSISTANTS Susan Livoti. LisaSaladino 

EDITORIAL PRODUCTION COORDINATOR Barbara Ross 


ADVERTISING OFFICE Zrff-Davis Publishing Company . One Paik Avenue. 

New York. NY 10016. {2I2>503-5I00 


ZIFF-DAVIS PUBLISHING COMPANY 


PRESIDENT KcrmeihH. Koppcl 

SENIOR VICE PRESireNT. MARKETING Paul Chook 

VICE PRESIDENT. OPERATIONS . Baird Davis 

VICE PRESIDENT. CONTROLLER John Vlacfaw 

VICE PRESIDENT. CREATIVE SERVICES HeihertSicni 

VICE PRESIDENT. CIRCULATION Alicia M»ic Ivans 

VICE PRESIDENT. aRCULATION SERVICES James Ramalcy 

VICE PRESIDENT. MARKETING SERVICES Ann Poliak Adclman 

VICE PRESIDENT. DEVELOPMENT Seth Alpen 

VICE PRESIDENT Hugh Tietjen 

BUSINESS MANAGER Cxy A. Giisufson 

PRODUCTION DIRECTOR Walter J Teriecki 


ZIFF COMMUNICATIONS COMPANY 


Pmkieiil Philip B. Korsani Executive VkcPmktrHl James D- Dunmng Jr Seukir Vice Presidents Philip Sine. Kenneth H. Koppel Vkf Pres- 
idents Laurence Usdtn. William Phillips. J. Malcolm Moms. Steven C. Feinman Treasurer Selwyn I. Tatdtman Secretary Berum A. Abrams 


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>ibrYwdkiMCIVhiJIM 4l)ll PI iMmcttv* Rradrr Strvkr SNiy. I 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
4 


LOOKING FOR THE BEST 
VALUE IN PC/AT COMMTIBLES? 



INTRODUCING THE $1495 A^STAR" 


Looking for a lower priced, higher 
quality PC/AT compatible than our new 
A*Star'“is like looking for a needle in 
a haystack. You’re more apt to come up 
with a case of hayfever. 

A^Star gives you features you 
won't get from any other vendor. Not 
IBM. Not Compaq. Not even those for- 
eign manufacturers. Features like a 220 
watt power supply, eight available ex- 
pansion slots and "network ready” 
multi-user operation. All for only $1495. 
And that price includes a 1.2MB dis- 
kette drive. 512KB memory, a fixed 
disk/diskette drive controller, a tactile 
feedback k^board (you II love it!) and a 
6/8MHz switch /software selectable 
80286 CPU. 

Best of all. A^Star is quality built 
right here in America by Wells Ameri- 
can Corporation - an American Stock 
Exchange manufacturer. So now you 


can buy with confidence from a vendor 
you can trust, just like you’ve trusted 
IBM. And youll get a ^nuine. top qual- 
ity product (not a cheap imitation) for a 
price even less than those “questionable" 
mail order clones. And if that’s not enough, 
it’s all money-back guaranteed! 


The $1495 Wells American AwStar.'" 



A rVIHI rVH UNLT Alwor 

THArS NOTHINO TO SNEEZE AT! 

[Hurry! Ths offer is limited.] 


□ I'm tired of sneezing! Have someone call 
me immediatety to take my order 

□ A*Star sounds terrific Tel me more. 


Name;. 








City: 


State: 

Zb: 


Wells American 

803/796-7800.TWX 510601-2645 
Sunset Boulevard • West Columbia. SC 29169 


IBM PMOnMCoinpiilM ATM AT«rtHM««n«nit <*lnl»«f\«icnatBu«»i«MM«en>->MCO‘PO'«ion 


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V O L V M h 5 N I! M B b R 14 





COVKRSTOR^ 


OPERATING SYSTEMS 
Xenix System V: A Multiuser 
Answer for the AT? 

Robin Raskin and Kaare 
ChrisiianfWtth the release of 
UNIX System y AT&T 
standardized its popular 
operating system and added 
enhancements for the business 
community. But it took Xenix 
System V from the Santa Cruz 
Operation to bring UNIX 
computing for the PC family up 

10 date 253 

SreCIAL REPORTS 
The Second Annual PC 
Magazine Awards for 
Technical Excellence: 

The Envelope, Please 
Charles Bermant and Barry 
Owen! PC Magazine singled 
out I985's most innovative 
hardware and software for 
special praise and our coveted 
silver medallion 239 

Project Database II; 

Flat-File Databases 

Barbara Krasnoff¥\iH-fAe 
databases lack the complexity 
of their relational and 
programmable cousins, but 
many offer well-designed 
interfaces, ease of use, and 
advanced features. Reviews of 
text-oriented databases and 
mailing-list managers are still 
to come when Project Database 

11 continues in the fall 269 

TRAINING 

1-2-3 Learning Aids: Many 
Paths to Proficiency 
Christopher Borr/ Alternative 
approaches to learning Lotus's 
1-2-3 range from on-disk 
tutorials to videocassettes and 
teaching aids for training 
tutors 309 


COMPUTERS 
Two Build-Your-Own 
Alternatives for AT Power 

Robin Baifa'n/Building your 
own AT — either from a 
prepackaged kit or components 
purcha.sed separately — doesn't 
require expertise with a 
soldering iron, but you may 
need lots of patience 185 


SOFTWARE 
Business Forecasting: 16 
Ways to Predict the Future 
Mar\ in Bnan/Fmm 
comprehensive packages 
ported from mainframes to 
menu-driven dedicated 
forecasting programs, 
statistical analysis software 
converts economic data into 
strategies for the future 211 

Software Safety Nets for 
Hard Disk Data 

Vincent Puglia/Tbe problem: 
you can't afford to ignore the 
need for reliable hard disk 
backup, but perhaps you can't 
afford an expensive tape 
system either. These II utilities 
help take the tedium out of 
backing up to floppy disks by 
streamlining the process and 
providing important status 
infonnaliun. .12.1 


The Enhanced Graphics 
Standard Conies of Age 
Stewart Alsop/Hiss a reliable 
standard finally emerged in the 
confusing, free-for-all graphics 
marketplace? And is it any 
gtxxl? The answer to the first 
question is “yes. for now." 
Tlie answer to the second: 
“absolutely " 140 

Achieving the Standard: 

1 2 EGA Boards 
Charles PetzoldIA standard is 
achieved when enough 
pnxlucts Jump on the 
bandwagon. In the ca.se of 
I BM 's enhanced graphics 
adapter, they have. The dozen 
standard-forging EGA boards 
reviewed here — the original 
from I BM and the first II 
competitors to “copy" it — of- 
fer a wide range of options and 
some attractive prices 145 


page 2.5.^ 


Fi: AIT RES 








I lUS I I OOKS 


Hands On: THE's $507 PC+, 
Plus Hardcard 20, Hercules 
Graphics Card Plus, Show 
Partner, Intel Above Board 
PS/AT, Tseng Labs and PC’s 
Limited EGA cards, and Point 
Five 

REVIEWS IN BRIEF 

Paul M. Stafford/The Twin, 
a 1-2-3 clone; Software 
Carousel, a memory manager; 
Strike, a spelling checker; and 
Checks <S Balances, a home 


accounting program 59 


\ IKWPOIM.S 


LETTERS TO 
PC MAGAZINE 15 

PC ADVISOR 

Gus Venditto/Tutbo cards and 
harddisks 25 


FROVl THE EDITOR’S 
SCREEN 

Bill Machrone/How We Select 
F,ditor's Choice Products. . 85 


JOHN C. DVORAK 
IBM Product Centers: 

The Final Analysis 89 

Inside Track 90 

PETER NORTON 
Kitchen-Table Entre- 
preneurs Revisited 103 


JIM SEYMOUR 
A Better Way to Support 

■Software 113 

STEPHEN MANES 
Networking: A Rocky 
Road 125 

STEWART ALSOP 
Designing the Perfect PC for 
the Home 1.71 


PKOin ( IT\TT\ 


PC LAB NOTES 

Give Your PC Added Utility 

Winn L RoscUCreating 
desktop utility programs, plus 
commercial desktop 
organizers 353 


PROGRAMMING/ 
UTILITIES 

Exploring the EGA, Part I 
Charles Petzoldmie hidden 
magic of I BM ' s EGA is put on 
display 367 


SPREADSHEET CLINIC 
Jared TaylorlHov/ to zap the 
bug in Release 2.0, and a macro 
that beeps when it shouldn't be 
run 3 87 


POWER USER 
Craig L Sfark/Speeding up file 
Uansfers and setting the color in 
Crosstalk 395 


USER-TO-ISER 

Paul SomersonlHow to cancel 
Call Waiting temporarily, plus 
a command to fix a BASIC 
prttblem 405 


PCTUTC« 

Charles Petzold/ A form-feed 
program; sorting directories by 
date using foreign-country 
format; Intel 8087/88 and NEC 


V20 chip compatibility 439 


PC MART 416 

PCBLUEB(K)K 420 

READER SERVICE 

CARD 433 

PROnU(-r INDEX 443 

COMING UP 447 

INDEX TO 

ADVERTISERS 451 


Cover Image: 
Gerard Kunkel 


WhAT’S inside 

As the longest running and 
most widely read personal 
computer columnist, John C. 
Dvorak has always been the 
consummate insider. With this 
issue, Dvorak joins the most re- 
spected lineup of columnists in 
the business: Bill Machrone, 
Peter Norton, Stewart Alsop, 
Jim Seymour, and Stephen Ma- 
nes. Like the legendary Yankees lineupof the twenties, this collec- 
tion of heavy-hitting opinion-makers is a real murderers’ row. 

Starting on page 89 in this issue and continuing in every issue 
thereafter, Dvorak — best known for his popular Inside Track that 
is required reading for industry movers and shakers — combines his 
trademark predictions, opinions, gossip, and exposes with insight- 
ful commenuiries on the industry’s central issues and controver- 
sies, We’ve been John Dvorak fans for years, and we’re sure you’ll 
be as well. 

Every month we receive hundreds of new-product announce- 
ments, all clamoring for your attention and your dollars. What 
readers tell us they want, though, are quick, accurate first looks. 
Since the arrival of senior editor Bill Howard last year, the focus of 
PC News has increasingly reflected this need. PC News has been 
updated (and enlarged) so that it is now the timeliest source of reli- 
able hands-on product evaluations anywhere — a useful comple- 
ment to the PC Magazine Labs comparative reviews in the middle 
of the magazine. And, as you can see for yourself on page 33, PC 
News even has a new design and a new name: First Looks, This is- 
sue’s First Looks include hands-on reviews of a $507 PC compati- 
ble, a switch that can speed up your PC’s microproces.sor to 12.5 
MHz, and an analysis package that presents an alternative to 
spreadsheets. 

“Am I glad I didn’t gel into that EGA market!’’ says Kevin 
Jenkins, president of Hercules Computer Technology, the compa- 
ny that makes the popular Hercules monochrome graphics card. 
\^o can blame him? It’s a Jungle out there: the market for en- 
hanced graphics adapters has become increasingly crowded in the 
past few months, with new boards announced every week and 
prices plummeting rapidly. Before contributing editor Charles Pet- 
zold even finished testing the dozen EGAs reviewed in this issue 
(page 145), he was planning reviews of the next batch fora follow- 
up article. (Two EGA boards that arrived too late to make the Fea- 
tures Department deadline are reviewed in this issue’s First Looks 
section.) 

After torture testing the EGAs, Petzold went a step further and 
wrote a set of powerful, practical EGA utilities — the first we’ve 
seen. The first half are in the Programming/Utilities column on 
page 367; more will follow in the next issue of PC Magazine. □ 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
7 








The new Diconix 150. Try it on for size. At 
even in very thin briefcases. It’s the one PC 



Copyrighted material 


only 2''H x 1 r'W x 6yj'D the 150 fits 
printer you can take lightly. Anywhere. 




A Kodak Company 


3100 Research Boulevard 
Dayton, Ohio 45420 
1-800-DICONIX 


CIRCLE 240 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



Smart. 

“Undoubtedly 
the most 
powerful,” 
Software 
Digest. 



Thediflfence is speed 


The Smart Spread- 
sheet is the fastest, 
most powerful mathe- 
matical modeling soft- 
ware you can buy. 

That’s not just our 
opinion: in recent 
tests by the indepen- 
dent National Soft- 
ware Testing Labora- 


tories Smart out 
performed Lotus 
1-2-3 in 39 separate 
tests of speed and 
capacity. 

But if speed alone 
doesn’t impress you, 
these facts will: 

Smart’s “virtual 
memory” lets you 


build models nearly 
ten times larger than 
ou could with 1-2-3. 
mart’s windows let 
you reference up to 
50 worksheets at 
once (that’s 49 more 
than Lotus). 

Then there’s the 
built-in Business 


CIRCLE 373 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


The difference is more 
than speed. 


Smart 1-2-3 



• Virtu«l Memory 

• \^ewMuKipte 
Spreadsheets 
SiimifUneeusty 

• Full-Screen 
Formula Editing 

e Link 

Spreadsh eets 

o Records 
English 
Commands 

• Designed For 
Multiuser LAN 
(file locking) 

o Programming 
Language 

o Built-In 
Communications 

• Not Copy 
PmtecM 


Yes 

No 

Yes 

No 

Yes 

No 

Yes 

No 

Yes 

No 

Yes 

No 

Yes 

No 

Yes 

No 


Yes No 


List Prices: 

singte^iser $495 S 495 

3-user LAN S995 S14SS 


Ask for a Smart Demo-Pack. 

Now for just $19.95, 
you can experience the 
complete Smart System 
on your single-user PC 
or LAN workstations. 

Your Demo-Pack 
includes all of Smart’s 
powerful features, along 
with a complete set of 
disk tutorids. To order, 
just call toll-free 800- 
438-7627 and ask for 
Dept. MS (in Canada or 
Kansas call 913-492- 
3800). 

Once you see the 
difference, you’ll get 
Smart. 


Graphics package: 

78 colorful ways to 
display your data. 

Pies, bars, scatters, 
stacks. 3-D, ex - 
ploded, you name it. 

Application Pro- 
gramming couldn’t be 
easier. Smart records 
English commands 
instead of key- 
strokes, so editing is 
quick and simple. 

A set of advanced 


statistical functions 
(regression, N-solve, 
etc. ) are included. 

Best of all. Smart 
inte^ates with a 
whole family of pow- 
erful applications. You 
can pull sales figures 
from The Smart Data 
Base Manager, then 
send graphs and 
charts to a report in 
The Smart Word 
Processor. 



The Smart SpieatMied 

■ 1986 InnoN’alive Software. Inc. 


Comes with free DS Backup — 
a $69.95 value 


” 5 ^ 


^ * X \ X % * % 

A nnouncing 7 different Express Hard 
DiskCards ^ from 20 to 60 megabytes 
starting at $449 — including an intern^ 

Hard DiskCard with automatic backup for your IBM AT " 



Complete Systems 


Each Hard DiskCard comes com- 
plete with everything you need, in- 
stalls in minutes, boots off the hard 
disk, has a programmable inter- 
leave factor of up to 1-to-l, and 
has plated media. You can add it to 
an existing hard disk and. for an ex- 
tra $95. have both disks act as one. 


Kasy Installation 


If you're someone who hates read- 
ing installation manuals or who 
gets intimidated installing internal 
disk drives, one of the Express 
Hard DiskCards"* is for you. Sim- 
ply insert it inside your IBM^PC, 
XT. AT or compatible, like any 
other add-on card. 


High Performance 


Express Hard DiskCards give you 
from 2U to 60 megabytes of rigid 
disk storage, and something more. 
The controller comes with a prtv 
grammablc interleave factor of up 
to 1-tO‘I. which means that you re- 
trieve data up to 6 times faster than 
the PC XT which has a 6-lo-l inter- 
leave controller, 


Access Speed 


The Express Hurd DiskCards. with 
an average access speed of 60 msec, 
gives you — in addition to that extra 
speed — head retraction. Before 
you start thinking you've just got to 
have head retraction, you should 


know that the 80 msec Express 
Hard DiskCards are rated at 50 g's 
pf)wer off and 10 g's power on. Fur- 
thermore. our 80 msec Hard 
DiskCards. like all Express Hurd 
DiskCards. have plated media. 
Most hard disks-on-a-card have 
iron oxide (it looks and acts like 
rust), which means if the head hits 
the iron oxide, it will gouge out me- 
dia and your data along with it. 
Plated media, on the other hand. 
liH^ks like a car's chrome bumper. 
If the head hits, it will cause little 
or no damage. That's why Express 
offers drives w ith high g tolerances. 

All of the benefits of our 80 msec 
drives aside, you may want to get 
our 60 msec drive just for the extra 
speed. But in addition to increased 


access speed, you'll be getting au- 
tomatic head retraction. 


50 percent faster 


Our 30 and 60 megabyte Hard 
DiskCards give you more storage 
space, but in addition, they alst) 
give you a transfer rate of 7.5 me- 
gabits per second — a full .50 per- 
cent faster than an IBM XT or AT [ 
hard disk. Faster speed is imjx>r- 
tant. and becomes more st» if you | 
want to combine disks. I 


One File. Two Di.sks 


With Express Systems' new Coa- 
lesce'" Software, you can add oar 
20 or .30 megabyte Hard Disk- 
Card”* to your existing hard disk. 
Tliey will both work together as 
though they were one disk — up to i 
144 megabytes worth . ' 

Coalesce not only merges the . 
two hard disks together, it bypasses I 
the DOS barrier of 32 megabytes. ■; 
That means that if you already own I 
a 114 megabyte hard disk, you can | 
add our 30 megabyte Hard Disk- 
Card and have a total of 144 mega- 
bytes as a single file! 

However, if you don't have a 


Features 

20AT** 

nm 

Models 

2060 .3080 

3060 

4080 

6060 

Capacity formatted 20.05MB 

20.00MB 

20.05MB 

30MB 

.3().08MB 

40.(XIMB 

60.16MB 

Tran.sfer rate 

5Mbits/sec 

5Mbits/scc 5Mbits/sec7.5Mbits/scc 7.5Mbits/scc5MbitSi'scc7.5Mbits''sec 

Avg. access time 

60msec 

80msec 

60m sec 

80msec 

60msec 

SOmscc 

60mscc 

Slots 

lV6j 

IVi 


W: 

IVi 

2 

2 

Media 

Plated 

Plated 

Plated 

Plated 

Plated 

Plated 

Plated 

Warranty 

1 year 

90 days 

1 year 

IV5 years 

2 years 

2 years 

2 vears 

Head lifter 

automatic 

manual 

automatic manual 

automatic 

manual 

automatic 

Price 

$449 

$495 

$595 

$695 

$795 

$995 

$1.(195 












I Discover why 
) companies like AT&T, 
I IBM, Bell Labs, 

I Polaroid, Kodak, 3M, 
L JC Penney, Sperry, 

I Hughe'S Aircraft, 
i Stanford University, ' 

^ Allied Corp, the 
Associated Press and 
> others have bought 
I Express Hard 
I DiskCards. “ 



Complete Hard Disk Kits — (all transfer rates 5 Mbits/sec) 



Formatted 

Storage 


Plated 

Media 



PC or 


Capacity 
in Mbytes 

Height 

Average 

Access 

Comrrtents 

PC/XT 

AT 

10 


no 

85 msec 

Low power 

$ 295 

N/A 

21 

'h 

yes 

85 msec 

Low power 

Call 

Call 

32 

Full 

no 

.10 msec 

CDC WREN II drive 

$1,295 

$1,195 

72 

Full 

no 

25 msec 

Ideal AT drive for LAN 

Sl.TW 

$1,695 

144 

Full 

no 

30 msec 

2 72MB drives as one volume 

t 

$3,395 

Removable Hard Disk 





10 


yes 

90 msec 

5 Mbits/s 

$1,095 

$1,095 

Tape Systems and Subsystems 

Data 

Transfer PC Or PC/XT 

AT 


Formatted Storage Capacity Height Rate (k sec) 

60 Mbytes 88 $ 795 $ 795 

60 Mbytes Subsystem 88 $ 1.045 $ 1,045 

21 Mbytes (unformatted) Start/slop Subsystem 24 $ 445 $ 445 

26 Mbytes Floppy Tape* Subsystem 31 $ 695 $ 695 

Controllers 

All of our hard disk and tape controllers arc available separately. Please call for prices. 
Subsystem Chassist 

Any of our disk or tape units arc available in an external subsystem for an additional 
S250.(K). You can mix & match any of our high hard disks or tape drives together or 
add any single full height hard disk. 

Power Supply 

150 Watt Power supply $75,004 

twith any purchase of PC or PC XT replacement 


1 hard disk now and want 40 or 60 
1 megabytes of hard disk storage. 
1 then our Express Double Disk- 
) Card’” comes with two hard disks. 
' You can use one disk to back up the 
) other with our automatic backup 
i software Auto DiskSave"" or for an 
i extra $95. you can buy Coalesce 
s and have both disks work as one. 


Free backup program 


^ All Express Hard DiskCards arc 
B available with a free backup pro- 
I gram, DS Backup.’" This easy and 

> convenient program — a $69.95 
/ value— makes backing up simple 
s and fust. And to receive it. all you 
1 have to do is ask for it when you 

> order. 


AT Backup DiskCard"' 


I How would you like to know that 
( your Ij^M ATs hard disk is always 
i backed up without having to think 
j about it. With Express Systems* 
V AT Backup DiskC'ard’" you can 
i have 20 megabytes of hard disk 
I backup on a card without taking up 
t valuable front panel space. The AT 
I Backup DiskCard comes with 
L Auto DiskSavc software, so you 



can backup by date, time, archive 
bit (since you last used a Hie), by 
subdirectory. Hie name or groups 
of Hies, or any name c'ombination 
using DOS wild cards. Further- 
more. you can schedule your 
backup for anytime you return to 
DOS. or at spcciHc limes. 

If you're worried about 20 me- 
gabytes not being enough space, 
wc include Express Systems Hie 
compression software. File Com- 
pactor.”* which compress binary 
files 30-35 percent, text files 40-50 
percent, and data base files up to 90 
percent of their original space. 
And not only will you not have to 
think about backing up your files, 
the AT Backup DiskCard will do it 
file-by-file at the rate of 3 mega- 
bytes per minute. 


Compatibility 


The Express Hard DiskCard is 
compatible with most IBM PC or 
XT compatible computers, includ- 
ing but not limited to. all Leading 
Edge*, all Compaq* computers. 
AT&T 63<X). Sperry. Zenith. 
Epson, and most others. And all of 
the cards can work with the IBM 
PC's 65 watt power supply. 


Upgradable 


If you already own an Express 
Systems Hard DiskCard. you can 
upgrade to any of our larger Hard 
DiskCards. Call for details. 


Warranty 


The Express Hard DiskCard 
comes with a 90 days to two year 
warranty, depending on the m<^el. 


Quick Delivery 


Order today and you‘11 receive 
your Hard DiskCard by Federal 


Express*. The next day or the day 
after — you decide. 

For the best buy in a convenient, 
easy to install hard disk, call 
Express Systems. 

S [Tl ® 

"Uses IBM AT or compatible 
controller. 

••Available only for the IBM AT or 
compatible. 

•••For IBM AT and compatibles, the 
interleave factor is dependent on its 
controller. 

{Takes up IV^ slots and works beside 
any Vi slot board such as floppy 
controller. 



Call ToU Free 1 - 800 - 341-7549 Ext. 3500 
In Illinois, caU (312) 882-7733 Ext. 3500 

Express Systems. Inc.. 1254 Remington. Schaumburg. IL 60195 
CIRCLE 380 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



AT Backup DiskCard. Express Hard OtskCard. Double DiskCard, Coalesce. File Compactor, and Auto OiskSave are trademarks of Express 
Systems. Inc. 














Are other diskette 
makers cutting 
more than prices? 


Ever wonder why a less expensive diskette is 
less expensive? 

Because it’s less diskette. 

True, most claim to be “certified 100% error-, 
free!’ But 1007o of what? 

Most manufacturers only test 1007o of the 
data tracks on their diskettes. But, unfortunately, 
they don’t test between the tracks. 

Dysan, on the other hand, tests 100% of the 
entire surface area. On every diskette we make. 

Why? Because even the tiniest undetected 
error between tracks can render a diskette incapable 
of formatting or reading and writing data. And 
capable of suddenly and irreversibly losing all 
your data. 

Here’s another way other manufacturers take 
shortcuts. To determine the magnetic strength 
of their diskettes, they follow a standard set by the 


American National Standards Institute ( A.N.S.I.). 

But Dysan exceeds that standard by 887o. 
Because the stronger a diskette’s magnetic signal, 
the longer it will record and retain your data. 

Why don’t other diskette makers go to the 
same extremes that we do? Quite simply, to save 
time and money. 

But at Dysan, we think there’s something 
much more important to save. Namely, your data. 
Which is why we never cut corners. 

For the name of the Dysan dealer nearest you, 
call toll free (800) 233-5099. 

CIRCLE 289 ON READER SERVICE CARD 

Dysan 

Somebody has to be better 
than everybody else. 




VIEWPOINTS 


Letters to pc 

MAGAZINE 



ENTHLSIASM ABOUT SHAREWARE 

I read your great article "Shareware; 
Nomini Fees Can Yield Big Value” {PC 
Magazine, Volume 5 Number 9) with en- 
thusiasm. However, I would like to add a 
few points about shareware. 

As a sysop of the Wargames RBBS, I 
feel that public-do- 
main software has 
exceeded the quali- 
ty of much com- 
mercially available 
software. For ex- 
ample, according 
to a recent survey 
that we conducted, 
about 70 percent of 
the users of our bul- 
letin board use Qmodem, the shareware 
communications package reviewed in PC 
Magazine. Significantly, many users 
switched to Qmodem from commercial 
programs such as Crosstalk and Hayes’s 
bundled Smartcom. 

Shareware also provides users with 
more-fiequent updates and newer versions 
than commercial packages because the au- 
thors distribute them through bulletin 
boards. And, since authors don’t pay for 
marketing, they keep more of the profits. 

Because of the frequency of the up- 
dates, PC Magazine's listing of major soft- 
ware contains many outdated version 
numbers. There were two other errors in 
the article: the file extension for ARC 
should be .EXE, not .COM, and Qmodem 
can store up to 200 numbers, not 100. 

Shareware is certainly the best way to 
market great software, and it can be more 
profitable than commercial packages. It 
should be encouraged. 

Jason Lin 

Santa Monica, California 


COPY PROTECTION BLUES 

Bravo! PC News (“Copy Protection Los- 
ing Its Favor,” PC Magazine. Volume 5 
Number 10) accurately and bravely con- 
demned copy protection schemes, reveal- 
ing how they create nothing but trouble for 
software users and publishers alike. 

I believe that most people who copy 
software for private use either cannot or 
will not pay the asking price. In either 
case, the thieves are not likely to be poten- 
tial customers of the illegally copied soft- 
ware. Their attimde is that if they can’t 
steal it, they’ll do without it. 

The unconscionable offenses of those 
who steal, rather than work, for their prof- 
its, whether bootleggers or businesses who 
knowingly allow employees to violate li- 
cense agreements, should be punished by 
the courts. These determined cheats can- 
not be stopped by any reasonable copy 
protection scheme; the cheaters are as 
clever as the protectors. 

So why let the unprincipled pirates 
jeopardize the smooth and effrcient use of 
computer software for the rest of us? As 
purchasers, licensees, sublicensees, or end 
users, we have the right to unobstructed 
access to our software and should be able 
to protect our investments with backup 
copies. Yet. as valued customers, we are 
persona non grata to a few arrogant soft- 
ware publishers foolish enough to believe 
that they can do without us. 

Phillip Cripps 

Van Nuys, California 


REPAIRS 

As a PC technician I want to add a few ob- 
servations to your article “The Repairs 
Game” {PC Magazine, Volume 5 Num- 
bers). 

Customers, don’t expect your techni- 


cian to be perfect. With the computer field 
changing so rapidly, your technician is try- 
ing his hardest to keep on top of changes. 
Put yourself in your tech’s shoes for a min- 
ute or two. All they see and hear arc dead 
machines and customers ranting and rav- 
ing about their problems. If a technician 
has done something 
extra for you. 
spread the good 
word with a letter 
or a nice follow-up 
call. You might just 
save a good techni- 
cian from burnout. 

You could also 
learn a little more 
about your hard- 
ware. Try to help diagnose the problem in- 
stead of just saying, “My PC won’t boot. ” 
Remember, we are all in the computer age 
together and should, therefore, cooperate. 

Ed Weissman 
Honolulu. Hawaii 


3278 EMULATORS 

I would like to clarify some points about 
Attachmate’s 3-N-l 3270 Coax Adapter 
reviewed in Charles Petzold’s article “A 
Window on the 3278 World” {PC Maga- 
zine. Volumes Number 9). 

Although Mr. Petzold stated otherwise, 
file transfer was functioning correctly; the 
3-N-l receives data exactly as transmitted 
from the host. If other products remove 
portions of the data file, there’s room for 
concern. In any case, we suggest host- 
based file transfer over the TSO EDIT 
transfer that was tested. 

Mr. Petzold missed the significance of 
our PC-DOS window. Instead of hot-key, 
we allow concurrent operation of a PC ap- 
plication and four host sessions. These 



SHAREWARE; 

SlMlWl I 1 ISl.XN 
tillllHX.VUrE 




PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
15 




The last thing 
you want firom 
your modem 
IS excitement. 

Ven-Tel modems let you use your phone to exchange 
information with PCs anywhere in the world. We 
think that’s pretty exciting. 

Getting line hits, dropped connections and 
incompleted calls from your modem can be 
thrilling m its own way, too. But that’s not the 
kind of excitement you need in business. And 
we go to great lengths to make sure you 
don’t get it. 

At Ven-Tel we’ve been mak- 
ing more reliable modems 
since 1974. 

Ven-Tel modems put less 
stress on your PC because 
they have fewer components— 
70 vs. the 300 or so in other 
modems. And while other manufac- 
turers may settle for random testing, 
every Ven-Tel modem must pass a 72 
hour “bum-in” period— plus exten- 
sive testing on real phone lines. 

As good as Ven-Tel modems 
are, we still back every one 
with a free ^t/e-year warranty. 
No other major manufacturer 
even comes close. 

So if you want a modem that won’t add the 
wrong kind of excitement to your workday, you want Ven-Tel. 


Ven^l 

Modems 


Our free 24-page booklet/‘How To Select The Correct Modem” contains specific information 
about our full line of modems.To request your copy, call 800-538-5121. In California, call 
408-727-5721. 


CIRCLE 364 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



Dac-Easy Accounting 
“Best Software Value” 


InfoWorid 

1985 “Product ofthe Year“ A%vsrd8 


lnt()>\orld| 


1965 
PRODUCT 
OFTHE 
YEAR 


(S' 


“Trendsetting Accounting Product of the Year” 


1 and more every 

1 U U ,V/U W day. That’s how 
many smart buyers have already 
streamlined their accounting with the 
fastest-selling, most highly praised 
accounting package ever introduced. 

Dac-Easy offers seven full feature 
accounting modules in a perfectly 
integrated package, with instant 

access to: _ .. 

• Forecasting 

•General Ledger ‘Inventory 

• Accounts • Purchase 

Receivable Order 

•Accounts Payable •Billing 

You can generate over 300 reports 
from 80 different routines. And best of 
all, Dac-Easy Accounting can be used 
to manage either service- or product- 
based businesses. 

Now the Dac-Easy Series expands with 
the addition of the widely acclaimed 
Dac-Easy Payroll and Dac-Easy Word. 
Dac-Easy Accounting and Payroll are 
even more powerful and flexible with 
the company of Dac-Easy Mate and 
Dac-Easy Port. Also new for 1986 eire 
Dac-Easy Accounting Tutor and Dac- 
Easy Payroll Thtor. 

The best-selling business solution is 
now complete. Read what the experts 
say. Compare power, features, ease of 
use and price. Then join more than 
100,000 people who have said "Yes!" 
to Dac-Easy. 

All the Dac-Easy products are non- 
copy protected, fully documented, 
and come with a 30-day money 
back guarantee. 

30-day money back guarantee 

Dac Software offers an unconditional guarantee on all Dac-Easy 
products( less shipping charges). There is a SIO restockim fee 
if the disk seal is broken. This guarantee is available on all 
products bougM directly from Dac Software 


Minimum Hardware Requirements: 

BM or other compatibles. 2S6K memory, two disk drives. MS- 
DOS, PC-DOS 2Q or later. 1^ column printer in compressed 
mode, color or monochrome monitor. 

MS-DOS is a trademark of Microsoft Cotp. IBM arxl PC- 
DOS 20 are registered trademarks of International Business 
Machines Corp. 



$6995 


NEW! 


E^B/PaywII $49.95 

The best in personnel and psyroll processing. Automatic tax 
calculations for all 50 stales, tremendous report features. 
Multi-departments, after-the-lact payroll, interfaces with Dac- 
Easy Accounting or can starxl alone. 

$49.95 

HtwciIuI. easy and Bexible. Includes 70000 word spell checker, 
mail merge, witxlows tor up to lour documents, cut and paste, 
search, word-breaking, wo^ count, and much more. 

BIMate $39.95 


The perfect companion to our best-selling accuuntirfgarx) 
payroll promrns. Add the Dac Road Map. calculator, color or 
mtensily selection, macros, print to screen option, and file 
windowing. Dac-Easy Mate makes your accounting fun. 

E^B/Port $29.95 

A great progi^ that sends your accounting and payroll files 
to your tavrrrite spreadsheet. Pick from your customer, verxlor. 
ch^ of account, inventory, or employee files. Select ranges and 
select individual fields. Fast, ea^ operation. 

E^BIjS^y^ $19.95 
B/^ $19.95 

These two programs nuke accfxinling and payroll a snap to 
leam. Can be by the beginner or by the current user as a 
handy, stand-alone supplement to the user's manual. 


PC World 

December, 1885 

"Dac-Easy is a genuinely amazing deal.” 

PC Magazine 
October 15, 1985 
"Editor’s Choice" 

‘Tve never before in a review come right 
out and told readers to buy a product, 
but I’m doing it now. Dac-Easy is an 
incredible value." 

PC Week 
August 27. 1985 

Call toll free or return coupon 
below today 

' 1 - 800 - 992-7779 

Ask for Operator #115 

In Texas or 

lor more information call 

214 - 458-0038 

TELEX: 5106000715 dac software 


dac software, inc. 

4801 Spring Valley Rd., Bldg. 1 10-B 
Dallas, TX 75244 

Please rush me the following products: 
Product #Copi€S Price Total 

DAC-EASY ACCOUNTING $69.95 


DAC-EASY RWROLL 
DAC-EASY WORD 
DAC-EASY MATE 
DAC-EASY PORT 
ACCOUNTING TUTOR 
WYROLLTinDR 

Add Shipping Charge 
Texas Residents Add Sales Tax (6l^%) 
TOTAL 

□ Check □ Money Order 

□ AMEX DVISA □ MASTERCARD 


$49.95. 
$49.95. 
$3985. 
$2985- 
$19.95 . 
$19.95 . 


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Company 

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#115 


CALL 1-800-992-7779 FDR 
IMMEDIATE RESPONSE 


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V I B W POINTS 


■ LETTERS 


functions, along with IRMA and IBM 
hardware compatibility, have proven ex- 
tremely stable. The minor problems he did 
encounter (even the buzzer) were correct- 
ed in our February release. 

Michael A. New 

Attachmate Corp. 

Bellevue, Washington 

Charles Petzold replies; 

/ am glad lo hear lhal Auachmate has fixed 
some of the problems / encountered in its 
3-N-l . As I said in my review, "There is 
much to admire in this package, ' ' but 
when I discovered that the PC-DOS win- 
dow disabled some normal DOS function 
keys and distorted the workings of DOS in 
other ways, my enthusiasm plummeted. 

In my tests of the 3278 emulation 
boards, I downloaded and uploaded the 
same files with all the packages that in- 
cluded EDIT-based file transfer software. 
Only Attachmate’ s downhuiding included 
the EDIT line numbers in the resultant PC 
file. Although I did not say so in my review, 
my notes also show that the uplottding log- 
ic failed to e.xit EDIT on completion . 

I definitely agree that host-supported 
file transfer software is preferable to 
EDTT-based transfers. However, the fact 
remains that in many environments, the 
EDIT-based file-transfer programs will 
have to suffice. Getting host-supported 
software installed on the mainframe may- 
be very diffiicult — not technically diffiicult, 
but politically diffiicult. There is still signif- 
icant resistance to PCs in general among 
DP managers, and data prtK essing back- 
logs (familiar to anyone who has worked 
in .such a corporate environment) may rel- 
egate such a project to low priority. 

Therefore, EDIT-ha,sed transfer .soft- 
ware is probably used more frequently on 
3278 emulation products than any of us 
would care to think. For this reason, I 
gave high marks to products that con- 
quered the difficulties inherent in develop- 
ing EDIT-based transfer .software. 


MUSICAL SOFTWARE 

I'm somewhat puzzled by the article “Mu- 
sic; The PC’s New Frontier." which ap- 
peared in PC Magazine, Volume 5 Num- 
ber 8. Although the article was well 
written and contained a lot of information 
about MIDI software and hardware, it did 


not cover all the available products. In par- 
ticular, Te.xture, Version 2.0. was not re- 
viewed although the author of the article, 
James Langdell. quoted Roger Powell, the 
author of the program. 

Texture is one of the most powerful 
software products of its kind. It has gained 
a following among many users, including 
such names as Bob James (composer of the 
Taxi theme) and John Kay (of the rock and 
roll group Steppenwolf). Not only that, 
product support of Te.xture is uncommonly 
good. 


■ How can you have a 
real Editor’s Choice if you 
don’t have the top players 
on the team? 


How can you have a real Editor's 
Choice if you don’t have the top players on 
your team or if you choose to keep 'em 
benched? I strongly feel that Roger Powell 
and Te.xture should be given equal time. 

Sheldon M. Smith 

Rochester, New York 

PC Magazine was aware r/Texture, Ver- 
sion 2.0, at the time the article was pub- 
lished. However, during the editorial cy- 
cle Roger Powell told James Langdell that 
the company marketing the product. Cher- 
ry Lane Publishing, was closing down its 
entire Cherry Lane Technologies division. 
Powell further e.xplained that he was in the 
prmess of establishing his own company, 
which would relea.se a revised version of 
Texture. Because its availability was un- 
certain at tiuit time, the product was not 
reviewed. Texture is currently available 
from MusicSoft, P.O. Box 274, Beekman, 
NY 12570: (914) 724-3668.— Ed. 


SETTING THE ACCOUNT STRAIGHT 

In PC Update's report (PC News, PC 
Magazine, Volume 5 Number 9) on Great 
Plains Software's newest release of the 
Great Plains Accounting Series, it was 
stated that Great Plains incorporated Soft- 
Craft’s Btrieve and BtrieveIN file-manage- 


ment programs into its new releases. This 
is correct. However, the article also said 
that Btrieve and BtrieveIN are public-do- 
main software programs; this is not true. 
There are no run-time royalties for Btrieve- 
based products, but Btrieve itself is not 
free, public-domain software. 

Also, Great Plains Software is located 
in Fargo, North Dakota, not Austin, Tex- 
as. And Btrieve and BtrieveIN — not the 
Great Plains accounting packages — are 
priced at $245 and $595, respectively. 

Tom Reinertson 
SoftCraft Inc. 
Austin, Texas 


CORRECTIONS 

The Fact File for Menu Manager from 
Phoenix Systems in PC Lab Notes (PC 
Magazine, Volume 5 Number 6) listed the 
wrong company address. The address 
should read 668 57th Street, Sacramento, 
CA 95819, In addition, the correct price is 
$75, not $ I (X). 

In the features table for the article “IBM 
Laptop Dignifies the DOS-to-Go Market" 
in PC News (PC Magazine. Volume 5 
Number 1 0), we listed the Morrow Fhvot II 
as having two 3 '/’-inch drives. The ma- 
chine really has 5'/4-inch drives. 

The article “Shareware; Nominal Fees 
Can Yield Big Value" (PC Magazine, 
Volume 5 Number 9) listed an out-of-date 
address for FAB Software. Newkey, Ver- 
sion 3.0, may be obtained for $24.95 plus 
$2.50 postage from FAB Software, P.O. 
Box 336, 'Wayland, MA 01778. 


HOW TO WRITE TO PC MAGAZINE 

Do you have a comment, compliment, or 
criticism about something you've read in 
PC Magazine'! A question you’d like to 
open up to other readers? Then send your 
opinion on paper or disk to Letters to PC 
Magazine, One Park Avenue, New York, 
NY 10016, or send your opinion through 
MCI Mail to PCMAGAZINE at address 
157-9301. We’re sorry we’re not able lo 
answer letters personally. 

All letters become the property of PC 
Magazine and are subject to editing. We 
cannot publish letters that do not include a 
name, address, and phone number for ver- 
ification. Ili4 


PC MAGAZINE • AUGUST 1986 
18 


ires TEXAS COMPUTER SYSTEMS 

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Floppy Disk Drives 

— — T 


.$105 


PRINTERS 

Panasonic 1080 S225 

Panasonic 1091 S239 

Panasonic 1092 S35® 

Panasonic 1592 S430 

Panasonic 3151 $412 

Olympia NP 5199 

Olymola RO 5249 

monitors 

Goldstar RGB 5349 

Roland Color Comp. . .5159 
Amber Composite ... -579 


TAPE BACK-UP 
SYSTEMS 


Microsystems 

MT25 External . 


$849 


. 25 Mg. File Oriented Tape Backup. 

Backup or restore Individual files, 

. groups of files or sntire disk. 

' lalernsl. fully porlsbie. plugs Ir 
floppy disk eontrollsr exlernal 
J eonneclor. One unit can back up 
your entire office. 

^ Other systems, 10-60 mg malahte ^ 


POWER SUPPLIES 

135 watt 585 

1 6Q watt (Special) ^ 

back-up POWER 

200 watts .... 5269 & $299 

425 watts 5449 

1 000 watts 5899 

MODEMS 

300-1200 All Hayes compatible. 

Everex Internal 5159 

Anchor Express 5225 

Volksmodem 12 5165 


■ 80286 Microprocessor 
m 1 Meg memory on motherboard. 

■ 1.2 Meg Floppy Drive. 

■ Floppy/Hard Disk AT Controller. 

■ f 92 waff power supply, 
u 8 Expansion Slots. 

■ CloclCCsIendar w/battery backup. 

B AT style keyboard. 

■ ATsly/e eab/nat wrfh key foe*. 

■ Set-up Software. 

■ f3 month warranty. 

BMHz. 33% taster than standard IBM-ATs. 

P ^ 

i CARDS j 

Color Graphics Card . . $119 | 

TCS Monochrome. . . • 5119 | 

TCS Multifunction 599 I 

TCS MFC wHh 3B4K ..$149 ^ 

I/O Clock Card 599 | 

Everex Edge 5239 . 

ftra phle Solution . . • • 5249 j 

“ MEMORY I 

256K Chips (Set ol 9). . .529 

AT MFC Board 5179 

(Holds 2 meg. memory) 


J 




CIRCLE 324 ON READER SERVICE CARD 
We do nol guarantee compatibility for aR lysleim. Irand name* lisied are registered trademarks. All 
sales are final. Returns lor repair require authorization number. Prices, specifications and availability 
are subject to error or change without notke. 


■ 5100 minimum purchat* required. 
■ All merchandise new with manufacturer's warranty. 
■ We accept cashier's checks, money orders, VISA, MC, C.O.O., 
end approved corporate PO's. (PO'a on net terms pay full 





MAKE YOUR IBM PC 
FASTER 


IN JUST 5 MINUTES! 


$595 


DON'T TAKE OUR WORD FOR IT. 
USE IT FOR 60 DAYS. IF YOU ARE 
NOT TOTALLY SATISFIED RETURN 
IT FOR A FULL REFUND. 

It sounds CTeat; the idea of a speedup board that you can 
ist plug right in 
wonderl 


just plug right in as easily as putting bread in a toaster. How 
ndei^l to be able to convert a PC_ or XT to a $4000 AT 


without the expense. But even when you get ready to spend 
$595.00 you want to be sure your choice is the very best. 

Here at PCSG we sell our IBM PC disk access speedup 
software by the thousands. But software doesn't do any- 
thing about speeding up the microprocessor (or CPU) speed. 
As you know the microprocessor is the brain of the computer 
that controls all the operations like screen updates and calcu- 
lations like a spreadsheet makes. 

Faster and smarter than an AT - 
PCSG guarantees it 

We wanted to offer a speedup card that would be the 


today. We could only be satisfied with a board that was the 
finest example of the engineering art. 

There is no question we have met our evety objective by 
developing and manufacturing the BREAKTHRU 286 card. 
This is the TCSt designed and most fi 
available today. We guarantee it. 

HERE IS WHAT MAKES IT SO SPECIAL. 


t functional speed up card 


is faster than the one found in the AT. A 16K cache memory 
provides zero-wait-access to the most recently used code 
and data. In benchmark tests the card accelerated software 
programs — both custom and off-the-shelf anywhere from 
z00% to as much as 700% . Wow! 

Third, you have full compatibility. All existing system 
RAM, hardware, and peripheral cards can be used without 
software modification. It operates with LAN and mainframe 
communication products and conforms to the Lotus/Intel/ 
Microsoft Expanded Memory Specification (EMS). Software 
comf)atibility is virtually universal. 

Fourth, it is the best there is. There are several other 
boards on the market. Some are priced about the same as the 
BREAKTHRU 286 and some are cheaper. We at PC^ have 
compared them all, but there simply was no comparison. 

What we discovert is that many cards being sold offer only 
a marginal speed up in spite of their claims. We found some 
to be merely versions of the obsolete 8088 or 8086, and others 
to be just poorly engineered. The 8MHz BREAKTHRU 286 is 
unequivocally the best executed and most completely reliable 
speedim board manufactured today. 

PCSG has since early 1983 dominated the lap portable 
market with ROM software such a Lucid spreacisheet and 
Write ROM that reviewers rated as excellent. We were proud 
to successfully enter the IBM PC market last year with disk 
access speedup software. Now we are so pleased with the 
BREAKTHRU speedup card. We use them on our own PC's 
to piake them faster than AT's. We are really excited about 
this product. 

PCSG makes the unabashed statement that the BREAKTHRU 
286 card represents more advanced technology than boards 
by Orchid, Quadram, Victor, Mountain, PC. Technologies, 
Pnoenix . . . we could go on. 

But an ad can't let you experience it for yourself. That's why 
we sell the BREAKTHRU 286 on a 60 day trial. If you aren't 
completely satisfied return it within 60 days for a full refund. 

It is priced at $595. Call today with your MasterCard, Visa, 
American Express or COD instructions and we will ship your 
card the very next day. circle 489 on reader service card 


First, it installs so easily. It is a half slot card, only five 
inches in length. You don't even have to give up a full slot. 
What's more, unlike competing products it works in the 
Compaq and most clones. The instructions are so simple we 
considered showing a picture of a child putting it in. ^sy 
diagrams show how you just place the card in an open slot, 
remove the original processor and connect a single cable. 
There is no software reauired. From that moment you are 
running faster than an AT. 

Second, it is advanced. The BREAKTHRU 286 replaces 
the CPU of the PC or XT with an 80286 microprocessor that 


PCR^CmCC^FUTER SUffORTORaiPl 


11035 Harry Hines Blvd. #207 .Dallas, Texas 75229 

214 - 351-0564 





PC BRAND: CAREFULLY CHOSEN 
PROGRAMMER TOOLS 


BRIEF Is Anything But. 
A Whopper of an Editor 

W ith a name that bebes its thorough- 
ness. Bnef'* * has every feature 
you’ve ever contemplated for your editor- 
in-chief l^xt. from keyboard or files, is 
housed in multiple buJTers. and scrolled 
through one or more winders you open, 
dose resize A text buffer may be called to 
different windows to view two areas at 
cxice A change in one changes both Ibxt 
blocks may be marked for printing, wniing 
to flies, movement to scrap buffers for cut 
and paste into other buffers, or deletion, 
with as many "undo " levels as you want 
Brief has text search abilities rivaling 
"grep", with wildcards for matching, 
^difference to intervening characters, 
acceptance of character ranges 
If you use Lattice, C86''\ or Wizard, and 
have 320k. you can compile your C 
program without ever leaving Brief It finds 
the lines with errors, and marches you 
through the text for repairs 
Parts of Brief were written with its own 
Lisp-Uke maao language which has 
structure. 32-character variable names, 
conditional executiCHi. loops, and you can 
actually read it' Nothing like the 
hieroglyphs we've seen elsewhere Bulletin 
board and public domain disks with 
macros ’’Simply the best text editor you 
can buy'-' Dvorak Infoworld (Needs I92k ) 
Ask for List PC Brand 
U0590 *19S Can 

HALO GRAPHICS 
SYSTEM Mam-BoanI 

Gxapbica Library 

■^le premier graphics library ihai got the 
ball rolluig for PC-based graphics and has 
grown so omnipotent that it supports over 
^ grai^ics boards - including IBM's 
EGA and Nr 9 Revolution's hi res senes - 
and has a multitude of mouse and printer 
drivers All that in each box. Separate C 
versions for Lattice M'sofi. Aziez. CI86 
What does Multi-Halo do’ A down to the 
last pixel grap^ucs library pdus functions to 
reset dnvers so distributed program can 
run on anything Wonderful value for single 
license Costly royalties though for 
redistribution Specify S03l5d Language 
List ‘300. Vtfe *219. With Dr Halo II. a free- 
standing "paint list *440, Us *299. 


WINDOWS for C/WINDOWS for DATA 
Microsoft Windows”* and TopView^ Compatible 


W indows for C™is a library of over 80 
funaions to add the pcaa and prac- 
ticality of window partitioning to your 
app^cation Unlimited windows, each 
defined in a C structure for easy reference 
throughout your program, can be made 
either to pop up or permanently overwrite 
the saeen Routines will saoll and 
highlight lists with anow keys, will read 
and scroll ASCII files vertically and 
horizontally in wuxlows. and even wnte to 
memory-loaded files off the screen 
Logical treatment of video anributes 
permits unchanged programs to run on 
color or morxxArome Colors of windows 
are set individually 
All functions are in separate modules, 
only those used are linked Only buffers 
holding on-saeen or temporarily 
obscu^ windows occupy RAM. others 
released dynamically B^ cverall rating 
and fastest di^ay in Bill Hunt’s 7/8S Tbch 
Jcnifnal review of five windcwnng products 
Windows for Data comprises all of 
Windcws for C but takes in data through 
the windows as well At the high level a 
single function lets you .speafy prompt 
string, field length, data type, screen 
locatKm. ptcnire target variable, then sets 
lesser functions scurrying to get and 
process a user's input. There are utilities to 
get system date arid time, mess with 
strings, create your own masks for fields 
Field optKins can require entry, prevent 
entry, permit insert or overtype, hoping 
on inv^id or overflow keystrokes, and 
attachment of field-specific help messages 


call for free demoi 

and functions you want called to display 
messages or validate entries. And you 
decide which keys will clear a field, jump 
to the next or prior, quit, etc Options 
diverse enough that a set of "fields " can be 
made to behave lite a Lotus”’* menu 
Specify Compiler List PC Brand 

TOlOO Windows for C *195 *149 

T0150 Windows for Data *295 *250 


We 30 days ^ 

TofLiHfoosnN 

creaking 

devekipeisdopwe oieer leflere. 
ducts constitutes ac- ^ 

°n,ng se^f^^^east review 


C-WORTHY LIBRARY' free demoi 
Fits Oat Applications with Shipshape Interface 


N ot the usual flotilla of functions for 
small crafting, but a formidable battle 
wagon for maior C engagements 
C-V'tonhy*'* wraps an entue user inter- 
face around your application Its full power 
can be summoned by only a few high level 
calls ProoP A single function call sets up a 
complete text editor in a screen window' 

• High level calls pop menus and scrollable 
lists to the screen, resionng the 
background when dismissed, and branching 
to the chosen activity in your application 
• Windowing facilities open poilholes of 
up to screen size for viewing virtual 
screens larger than the physical screen 
• Full on-screen context-sensitive help 
rTvinagement Keyboard entry routines 
look for the help key and interrupt with 
paged text windows explaining what to do, 

• Full error message interface sends error 
codes to C Vliforthy which discusses pro- 


C-TREE 

B-Tree File Manager, Source Code, No Royalties! 


C tree is sturdy code that has 
weathered many seasons of pro- 
longed and widespread use It comes in C 
source so you can modify it to fit .i special 
case No royalties provided you bind it into 
your binary apf^icaiion 
C-tree's design splits nodes to allow any 
number of users to access an index file 
simultaneously even when updates are in 
progress So multi-user configurations and 
adaptation to networks ate possible 
Record-locking routines are provided for 


dBC Lattice Library Maintains dBASE 
Compatible Files With the Power and Speed of C 

Use dBC for custom work for clients, or 
on Its own It’s a complete ISAM file 
manager for C whether or not dBASE will 
be used in tandem, supports all four 
memory models, and can have sixteen 
index and data files open Big discount to 
buyers of both dBASE 11 and III versions 
Specify Lattice. Microsoft 3 x. or DeSmet 
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*250 *195 

*500 *390 

>250 *195 

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DOS31/32. UNIX and XENIX 

Thani® to source code whidi does not 
deviate from the K&R standard. C-tree can 
travel Tbste in many envuonments prove 
that C tree gives your application a ticket 
to anywhere 

C tree permits any number of keys for a 
data file, supports duplicate keys, 
alphanumeric or numeric supports files of 
variable record length, multiple teys m 
one index file and k^ of variable length 
Both high level ISAM routines whidi handle 
details with minimum coding and decom- 
posed step by-step functions you can a 
directly It’s comprehensive 
Ask for list PC Brand 
F0660 *396 *329 


d mamtains files and their indexes which 
exactly replx:ate dBASE file design. So 
dBASE can read and update them And 
the reti«rse dBC can use any files created 
by dBASE Now C and dBASE can operate 
on the same data bases interchangeably 
'Dial opens up the widespread culture of 
dBASE installations to exploitation by C 
programmers Tap that market, avoxl the 
resident dBASE language, and gam the 
advantages of C with th£ single produa 
dBCs functions parallel all dBASE's file 
handling commands, many decomposed 
to give closer control Each backed by 
demo source files on disk 


blem with user Gone is all that error- 
checking clutter from your core program 

Your application is nested m this power- 
ful envuonmeni C-Wirthy's architecture 
uses C’s pointers to functions to drive your 
awlication 

C Worthy includes utilities to mamtain 
text files of help and error messages Their 
segregation means applications can read- 
ily be translated into foreign languages 
without program rewritmg Plus display 
rouunes resize for text length 

Decomposed low level functions used by 
the high-level calls are supplied All 
machine dependency is housed in inier- 
changable overlays loaded al nin-time 
Thus no recompilation needed to run on a 
mix of PC and MSDOS machines. 

C-Wonhy hands you a consistent and 
intuitive interface and a revolutionary 
design approach Novell found it play^ a 
. key role aixJ accelerated development" 
making NetWare'*’' e.isier to use You owe • 
It to yourselves to take a look " 

Speafy Compiler List PC Brand 
T0500 ‘295 *269 

T0550 Network License *495 *449 

CURSES Unix Style Screen 
Management 

Curses from Lattice ’ ’ manages the screen 
ofihe PC like Unix'” curses Library of 84 
functions and macros parallels Unix with 
matching parameter lists So Unuc pro- 
grams are at home on the PC and vice 
versa Keeps any number of screens in 
memory. suw»rts color, vast fundion set to 
get characters, wrap lines, scroti, blank 
lines, highlight, etc Like Unix refreshes 
saeen only on youi command Ask for 
L08S0 List *125 Here *99 With Source 
L0860. *250/*199 


PANEL Feature-Laden Screen Design Tool 


Versions 
LOOn Fbr dBASE II 
LCCn With Source 
LOm For dBASE III 
LCIII With Source 




W riting your own scieenware can 
blow completion dates and profits 
Panel''* works with you mieraaively to 
set up foolproof screen displaysand 
data entry forms rapidly Output is C 
source code 

Not iust single plane layer your screen 
designs with up to ten overlapping 
images Background pop-up lists, help 
boxes, and alternate input fields 
Panel builds in a user interface for 
keystroke movement within and between 
fields supplies validation routines for 


checking user field entries Diverse at- 
tributes may be selected for any field - 
size, data type, color, conversion of input 
10 upper case, clearance of existing data 
when new entry is started, masks for 
standard formats(eg. dates), phrases 
which fill in when their first letter is 
typed, multiple-choice lists from which 
to choose by cursormg a highlighted bar 
Fields may be multi-lined and scrolled if 
larger than the screen space allotted 
ihem Specify S0400& Compiler List 
*295 Us *229 




edocd- 

fob 




For Orders, Literature, or Catalogs, Call Us at... 

800 PC-BRAND 

That's (800) 722-7263. In NY State caU (212) 242-3600 
PC Brand, 150 5th Ave., New York, N.Y. 10011-4311 

Telex 667962 (SOFT COMM NYK) 

1986 PC BRAND 


aRCLE124 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


TODAYS TOP QUAUTYAIDS TO 
PROGRAMMING PRODUCTIVITY 


DAN BRICKLIN’S DEMO PROGRAM 

Storyboard Yonr Program 


GRXi£NliEAP BotmtiM 

FUNCTIONS a™-* 

C source, assembler source, and binary 
libraries of 225 functions for many com- 
bers. Emphasizes tight functional groups 
mgs to minimize loading code which your 
application may never use Manual helps 
select functions, bulleun board, too 
A samplmg DOS extensions for file and 
directory manipulation. Screen to select 
mode page, monoduome or color, palene. 
cursor shape positiorung; clearmg and 
saolling: pixel get and put. read Lghi pen. 
^imgs. Center, justify, etc: eBicieni list 
operations which add. delete sort string 
pointers for top ^leed Other graphics 
diaracter pnmmves. keyboard status, func- 
tion ley assignment, ume/date read 
registers and memory size peek and 
poke Mature best-seller Specify S0770 & 
Compiler List *185 Here *139 


PFORCE Pboeaix Pfanctitm 

Pfes ti val 

Uitus^ didn't do badly pulling it all 
together m one place Phoenix has follow- 
ed suit with the ultimate integrated C 
library, offering everything from low level 
functions for hardware access to complete 
b-tree database management Along the 
way are prerequisites such as string 
marupulauon, time/date field and screen 
ediung. but also four styles of menus (Lotus 
included), windowing, background task- 
ing. DOS interfaces, directory manage- 
ment, even intemipt-dnven commuiuca- 
uons. Design emphasizes objects, so 
charaaenstics of windows, databases, 
records and helds can be initiated and 
changed outside functions 
One large collection in place of bits and 



quick reference, and on-line help 


Ei«ryihtng in source, no royalties, all 
memory models of Lattice. M'soft Specify 
S0220 & Compiler. List *475, PCB *349 


GREENLiEAFneiio wotu 
COMMUNICATIONS 

Want your application to communicate 
with other users or remote date bases by 
asynchronous communications built nght 
into your C programs! Even if you don't need 
It now, that's a skill to have at the ready! 

120 functions and demo programs m 
txyih C and assembler source code set up 
separate transmit and receive nng buffers 
for up to 16 simultaneous channels In- 
terrupt driven so you can halt an incoming 
record, display a. file it. let the user edit it. 
then continue Goodbye separate com- 
murucattons software 

Supports up to 9600 baud, ASCII or 
binary, any parity or word length. 8250 
UART^. )Con/)(off and Xmodem. 
WidefTrack receive Specify S0750 & 
Compiler List *185. Us *1^ 


PRE*^ Pick tile Lint 6nm 
TtyarProgma 

Pre-C IS like UNlXs lint, It finds pro- 
blems your compiler won't, Problems 
that a debugger will have trouble figur- 
ing out Even problems which will 
cause trouble with other compilers 
Compilers see one module at a time 
Modules only meet at link time Pre-C 
looks at ail modules at once and reports 
conflicts in data typie declarations, func- 
tion call parameters which disagree 
with functions, machine-dependent ex- 
pressions which inhibit portability. It 
^>ots obsolete usage (even C changes), 
casts with suspect conversions, 
variables never used, functions never 
called, unreachable code Adheres to 
UNIX System III compile standard to 
ensure your portability Ask for: 

P0590. List *385. Ours *279 


T he Legendary One has aeaied 
Metaphor Tvro when the rest of us are 
stiU on Zero Dan's first was the onginai 
electronic spreadsheet (VisiCalc^, This 
one IS for programmers 
Words don’t express program ideas 
because programs are screens' Dan's 
Demo creates slide shows Create a 
screen - a sna^ot of your planned pro- 
duct as It runs Anything goes, words 
borders, box rules inverse and underlining 
erf monochrome fore- and bacl^ound color 
Copy this "slide" to an empty screen 
Change it a little, to show the next instant of 
run-ume Do it again Presto a whole slide 
show of your program in action 
All 250 characters and attrbutes are 
available from scrollable lists which pop to 
the screen All cwnmands are layer^ in 
Lotus-style popup menus Frequent 
dwices mapped to function keys as well 


80x25 dizuacter mode not bn-mapped 

Saeen areas can be blocked for cut and 
paste or filled with color or characters, 
even blink Slides can overlay on others 
can be shuffled, deleted Slides can pro- 
ceed at ume intervals or branch anywhere 
in the shde sequence depending on user 
key hits 

Invaluable to prototype the program you 
are about to write to position the labels, 
choose the color decor, smoothe out the 
keystroke interface Or load the ’’capture" 
utility and snapshot the screens of any run- 
ning program for an instant slide show 

Each ct^ entitles you to redistribute fifty 
of the slide projector program that runs 
demos Plain manual, no binder keeps 
price of big product small "Might 
become the essential tool in user inter- 
face prototyping, " Tbch foumal Ask for 
NOlOO List *75 US <69 


BASTOC optimize®' 

Translates BASIC Into C 

F or a trifling price BASTOC™ nxwes 
truckloads of BASIC code ewer to C 
It's a translator whxrfi takes in Mxmjsofl 
Extended BASIC and emits pure K&R C 
for Lattice 30 It will optxinaily convert 
your program into a single nxmolithK: C 
function or decompose d into separate 
functions, one for eadi GOSU6 label 
)^rsion 2's optimization dramatically 
reduces elocution time Converts to in- 
tegers those variables in BASIC programs 
w^h do not need Ooating point. Where 
BASIC uses full assignment statements to 
increment counters. BASTOC converts to 
C's compact form Strings dynamically 
allocated ndding your apjrfxxmon of BASIC's 
catatonic halts for garba^ collection. 
Creates struaure of even convoluted 
BASIC code Huge worksaver 
Ask for: PC Brand 

S0375 *495 <399 


SIwpping List for the Power Workbench 


ASSEMBLERS A DEBUOOERS 

Advanced Ikace-ftS Morgan. ASM Interpreter 
Codeamith-8€ Debug^r by Visual Age 
Cdebugger by Micro-Software Developers 
CSO Debugger C source level by Mark Williams 
C-Sprite Dagger by Lattice, source level 
Microsoft Macro Assembler with Utilities 
Periscope I Debug^r Data Base Decisions 
Periscope II Data Base Decisions 
Pfix86 by Phoenix. Assembly level debugger 
Pfix86 Plus by Phoenix. Symbolic Debugger 
The F^filer DWB Associates, with Source 
BASIC LANOUAOE 
BetterBASIC Summit Software 
BetterBASIC Utilities 8087 Math Support 
Btrieve Interlace 
Run-Time Module 

Microsoft BASIC Interpreter for XENIX 
Microsoft QuickBASIC Compiler full BASICA 
Professionel BASIC by Morgan 
808? Math Support 
Ihie BASIC True BASIC Inc 
Run Time Module 

Ihie BASIC Libraries Btrieve. Asyn. Sort, etc 

C COMPILERS 

G-86 Compiler Computer innovations 
Lettice C Mmpller from Lattice 
Let's C Compiler by Mark Williams 
with CSD Source Level Debugger 
MWe-M: Mark Williems C Development 
Microsoft C Compiler 

C INTERPRETERS 
C-lbrp by G/mpet Software 
instant C by Rational Systems 
Interaetlve-C by IMPACC with debugging 
RUN/C ProfesalonsI from Lifeboat 
RUN/C Without Loadable Libraries 
TIXT EDITORS 
Brief from Solution Systems 
eVUE Lattice 
with Source 

Epsilon by Lugaru Software, like EMACS 
ftst C by Lifeboat 

FirsTIme by Spruce Technology. C syntax 

Kedit by Mansfield, similar to Xedit 

LSE, the Lattice Screen Editor Multi Window 

Pmete by Phoenix, with Macros 

Ibxt Management Utilities Grep. sptaf. ditf. etc 

VMH by Compuview 

Vedit Plus by Compuview 

PILE MANAGERS 
Btrieve by Softcraft. no royattfes 
Btrieve Network by Sn^craft 
C'tree by FairCom - no royalties, source . 
dBC doASE file manager from Lattice 
with source 

dMfista single user DBMS by Raima 
with source 

dbVista multi-user DBMS 
with source 

Opt'Teeh Sort Can sort Btrieve files 

SCREEN DESION 

Curses by Lathee. UNIX screen designer 
With Source 

Online Help from Opt-Tech Data 
tanel by Roundhill. no roj^liies 
View Manager for C by ^ise 
Windows tor C \^rmont Creative Software 


LIST 

OURS 

1/b 

149 

145 

109 

165 

139 

fb 

75 

Ifb 

139 

150 

109 

295 

269 

145 

129 

195 

149 

395 

279 

125 

99 

195 

165 

99 

85 

99 

85 

250 

225 

350 

295 

99 

79 

99 

79 

50 

47 

150 

119 

500 

420 

Var 

Call 

395 

289 

500 

299 

/b 

69 

150 

129 

495 

369 

395 

259 

300 

249 

500 

395 

249 

219 

250 

185 

120 

109 

195 

CALL 

75 

69 

250 

195 

195 

169 

130 

105 

295 

229 

125 

115 

125 

100 

225 

159 

120 

100 

150 

119 

225 

180 

250 

195 

595 

465 

395 

329 

250 

195 

500 

390 

195 

159 

495 

429 

495 

429 

990 

849 

149 

119 

125 

99 

250 

199 

149 

119 

295 

229 

2/5 

209 

195 

149 


Windows tor Data includes Windows for C 
ZVIaw Data Management Consultants 

GRAPHICS 

Essential Graphics by Essential, no royalties 

GSS Graphics Development Toolkit 
GSS Kernel System by Graphic Software 
GSS Kamel System tor IBM RT 
GSS Metafile Interpreter 
GSS Plotting System 
Halo Graphics Kernel System 
with Dr Halo II. by Media Cybernetics 
COMMUNICATIONS 
Asynch Manager by Blaise, lor C or Pascal 
Greenleaf Communications by Greenteaf 
Software Horizons Pack 3 

UTILITY UBRARIES 
Blaise C Tools 1 

Blaise C Tools 2 Call about combined price 
C Food Smorgssbord by Lattice 
C Utility Library by Essential. 300 functions 
Greenleaf Functions by Greenleaf Software 
PforCe by Phoenix, vast library 
Software Horizons Packages 
TopView Ibol Basket Lattice, source avail 
Vltomin C by Creative Programming 
DEVELOPMENT TOOLS 
Code Sifter by David Smith Software. Profiler 
C-Worthy by Custom Design Software 
CAWorthy tor Network Menus, he/p errors 
Dan Bricklln's Demo Program Prototyper 
LMK from Lattice by Lattice, 'make' like UNIX 
PC4.lnt by Gimpel ^ftware, after UNIXS hnt' 
PFInish by Phoeni*. EXE performance analyzer 
Plink86 by Phoenix. Overlay Linker 
Plink86 nus Utilizes memory for overtays 
Pmaker by Phoenix, like UNIX 'make' 

Pre-C by Phoenix. UNIX hnt-alike 
Ptantasy Pac six Phoenix products 
OTHER TOOLS 

BASTOC by JMI. convert BASIC to C 
BASIC-C BASIC's functions added to C 
The HAMMER by OES Systems 
PASM86 by Phoenix. Macro Assembter 
PTel by Phoenix, Binary File Communicator 
Rtrieve by Softcraft. Btrieve Report (generator 
Xtrieve by Softcraft. Query Utility for Btrieve 
PORTIUN COMPILERS S UTILITIES 
ACS Time Series by Alpha (Computer Service 
Forlib- Plus by Alpha Computer ^rvice 
Microsoft FORTRAN Links with Microsoft C 
Microsoft FORTRAN for XENIX 
Pro FORTRAN by Prospero 
RM/FORTRAN by Ryan-McFarland 
Scientific Subroutine Library by Peer/ess 
Scientific Subroutine Packa^ by Alpha 
The Statistician by Alpha Computer 
Strings A Things by Alpha Computer 

OTHER LANGUAGES A UTILITIES 
Microsoft COBOL Compiler 
Microsoft COBOL Compiler for XENIX 
Microsoft COBOL Tools with Source Debugger 
Microsoft COBOL Tools tor XENIX 
Microsoft Lisp New Common Lisp 
Microsoft MuMath Includes MuSimp 
Microsoft Pascal Compiler Links with M’soft C 
Microsoft Pascal C^pller tor XENIX 
Pro Paacal by Prospero. ISO Validated 


295 

2S0 

245 

199 

250 

210 

495 

399 

495 

399 

795 

676 

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495 

399 

300 

219 

440 

299 

175 

149 

185 

139 

149 

119 

125 

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100 

89 

150 

109 

IBS 

139 

185 

139 

475 

349 

\^r 

Call 

250 

199 

150 

139 

119 

99 

295 

269 

495 

449 

75 

69 

195 

149 

139 

125 

395 

279 

395 

279 

495 

359 

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1295 

895 

495 

399 

175 

139 

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179 

295 

219 

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85 

75 

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469 

70 

59 

350 

219 

495 

389 

390 

345 

595 

399 

175 

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269 

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269 

70 

59 

700 

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995 

795 

350 

259 

450 

333 

250 

189 

300 

199 

300 

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415 

390 

345 


PRICED TO SAVE YOU MONEY, 
SHIPPED FAST ANYWHERE. 

INTERACnVE-C ne'M' LATTICE C COMPILER 

Compiler-Compatible Itttexpteter, Editor, Debugger bSuiofVpgradea to tbe Best Selling C Compiler 


E arlier C interpreters were miraculous 
compromises InieractiveC™ shows 
how far C interpreters have come More 
than an interpreter, ImeracQve-C is a fully- 
integrated development environment a 
ccxnpdeie K&R interpreter bound tightly to 
Its cwn editor and debugger. 

Slice through programming projects like 


RUN/C 

PROFESSIONAL 

C Interjaeter Links 
Binary LOrraries 

R un/C comes in an apprentice and 
pro verson. The professional model 
dynamically loads and unloads multiple 
bmary hmcbon libraries like C-Food 
Smorgasbord™ and Halo Graphics™ — 
potentially any library compiled with 
Lattice's large model Inside this inter- 
preter your C program can readi for func- 
tions in the best of commercial libraries 
"Hiis C interpreter behaves like PC BASIC 
meets WordStar* Use fullsaeen edmng 
to create a program RUN d. If it stumbles, 
LIST It, EDIT d, RUN d again, fix d again. 
Use ^dniliar commands like LOAD MERGE. 
SAVE. FILES, even TRON and TRACE 
Ideal for program development Put up 
code at high sp^, try out things devil- 
may care let RUN/C find your malaprops. 
Blast away until fight little code segments 
are undyingly faithful 
Lots more features: system interrupts, a 
diell oxnmand to invote any (grating 
system command without leaving Run^ 
debugging aids ingeniously installed as a 
Run/C function. Call for debugging condi- 
tionally from within your program, a 
specific function or a menu d aids m- 
duding immediate mode single-step trac- 
ing. dianging of variable values- 
Manual shows how to develop the inter- 
im to a commeroal library, using the Lat- 
tice compler (a must!) Link your own func- 
tion arduve the same way (320k minimum; 
5l2k recommended to fit libraries ) 

Ask for S0950 List. •250 PCB *18S 


PLINK86&PLUS 

Cacbod Opesria^Mnctaiso 
Msmary ETse 

Long the (7«rlord of overlay Imtets. stan- 
dard Plink86 shoehorns large programs 
into small machines by sharing memory, 
swapping program segments in from disk. 
A 51^ program could run in a 128k 
machine for example Tlie Hus version 
goes beyond, if it finds itself in a larger 
madune it mo<^ whaiei^r program 
overlays that fit into leftover memory 
Overlays now swap at memory spe^ not 
dt^ qseed. It also can automaticaUy 
restore a displaced overlay to whidi a 
subsequently called ov«riay must return, 
and assign library modules to a program's 
root segment or its overlay areas 
Plink86-Plus: list: M96. Us *359. Plink86: 
List. *396. Us. *279 


a hot knife through butter Extensive error- 
checking insures immediate detection of 
program misbehavior State of the art 
debugging tools indude breakpoints, 
watdivalues, several stepping options and 
interactive viewing and modification of 
variables. An InteractiveC e»:lusive lets 
you interrupt to edit and ‘bontmue " frcm 
where you left off Eliminaies plodding 
replays of already debugged code — the 
b^ and chain d other interpreters. 

Operate Interactive-C using adjustable 
edit, command, and status wiridows Ibg- 
gle a second screen showing only your 
program’s output — never any crov^ed 
intermixing C>r. boost productivity wuh 
twin CRth^ Load objed code of functions 
you have already compiled Or of com- 
mercial libraries. Interactive-C has imme- 
diate mode syntax checking both as you 
type and run, arxl cursor positioning 
precisely pointing at an error, not possible 
with inaemental or pseudoccmpilers 
which leave source code behind 

100% compiler compatible — right down 
to header files and library calls. Fbrt pro- 
grams between Interactive-C and your 
com[xler with no modifications whatever — 
not even tncky areas of dynamic memory 
allocation and I/Q 

Specify List. PC Brand: 

E950 & Compiler *249 *219 


L attice now embraces key UNIX™ 
enhancements Mudi hm entered 
the language since K&R: void functions 
returning no value, enumerated data types 
to assign step^ied values to variables, data 
passing ben^n structures by assignment. 

1)16 greatly expanded libraries (325 
functions.^ enable the file shanM and 
record locking precisions of DCS 3. 1, pr> 
vide a full axnplement of transcendentals, 
and a host of utilities to mimic the UNIX 
and XENIX™ environments 
Lattice 3.0 defaults to the ANSI proposed 
standard when you need strict adherence 
but axnmand line options restore leniency- 
And It adc^ ANSI checking of external 
functxxi arguments by data type to kill bug 
swarms when moduli )om up at link time 


you 


pfOWC*® 


GSS GRAPHICS SYSTEM 

Leave the Device Driving to aNSI cg> ^ 


G SS™ has reconfigured two compo- 
nents of Its comprehensive graphics 
tools to conform wuh the ANSI Computer 
Graphics Interface (CGD standard 
At the heart of the system is the Develop- 
ment IboUot which contains all language 
interfaces and device dnvers for k^- 
boards, mice, joysticks, tablets, printers. 
;^ers. cameras, and more Dnvers house 
management of vector graphics (plotters) 
and bitmaps used by raster input devices 
(scanners) to insulate the application pro- 
gram from concern for device Khosyncracy. 
No one else has implemented CGI that 
way It means your programming remains 
generic, just switch dnvers and the same 
program will dnve a different device 
Kernel™ conforms to level 2b of 
ANSI’s Graphical I^mel System (GKS) and 
contains all its needed dnvers and 
language bindings. I^mel has macro level 
tools to draw and color an ob)ea. store the 
sequential instructions, and recreate the 
object on its own. as well as segment it, 
transform it, etc So powerful, a single com- 
mand may represent several score lower 
level statements 

Plotting has the equivalent GKS tools for 
graph and diart generation and theu cap- 
tiorung hand it a^es and oranges, say 
pie", and it bates the numbers into a 
digestible dis;^ay for screen or ploners. 

Kernel and Plotting ha'^ tools to convert 
images they create to ANSI Computer 
Graphics Metafiles (CGMs), a totenized 
standard for storing every form erf graprfuc 
image as data. Die Metafile Interpreter 


reads the contents of a CGM and inter- 
prets n with full CGI capability for re- 
creation on various devices. 

(Quality software’ IBM thinks so They seU 
the GSS senes under then own label 

Unit royalties and annual fees have been 
instituted for redistribution Needs 256k 
Ask for List. PC Brand: 

GSOlO CGI Dvlpmtlbolkit *496 
GS020 Kernel System >495 
GS02S Kernel for IBM RT *795 
GS030 Plotting System *495 
C^040 Metcifile Interpreter *295 


Lattice now delivers smaller £XE files, 
boasts very fast link tunes and a more e& 
cient aliasing algorithm New opoons 
generate code to use 80186 and 80286 
features; 8067 erf course sensed and util- 
oed. Lattice has enjoyed pre-eminence so 
long that developers have created far 
more snapon tools for Lattice C than any 
other cwnpiler. William Hunt 's PC Tbch 
Journal review of 12 compilers awarded 
Lattice the only “very good “ rating for 
add-on library availability. 

Ask for; List; PC Brand; 

SOlOO *500 *299 


BETTER BASIC 

Convert MiaeosoaBBSIC 
Structured, Compilable. 

C ombines the fainilianty of BASIC vmh 
the best features of C Pascal, and 
Module 2. yet BetterBASIC is 100% com- 
patible with Microsoft's GW™ BASIC and 
IBM BASICIA including graphics, sound, 
and assembly language calls So load your 
old programs and RUN. SAVE and they are 
conNerted ai^omaocally to BetterBASIC' 

It's big: Needs I92k; programs can go to 
I the PCs full 640k. It’s comfy: Behaves like 
M'soA BASIC at the mleractive level, with a 
full-screen editor, direct stat^nent execu- 
tion. and always poised to RUN. It's fast 
Each statement diecked and ccxnptled 
once; not every erne encountered Sieve 
runs 6 times faster than with M'soft 
elite structures house file records so 
goodbye to FIELD MK1$, CVD 15ET, etc 
Named "procedures'' replace GOSUBsto 
linenumbers Lots more features: built-in 
linker for comiiMled modules; trace: debug- 
ging breakpoints, cross-reference com- 
mand; 32k strings, IX)S and BKDS calls and 
interrupts; recursion Run-time module 
stores object code for redistribution 


*399 

Ask for:: 

List 

Us: 

*399 

S1200 BetterBASIC 

*196 

*165 

*676 

S1201 RuiHime Module 

*250 

•225 

>399 

S1202 8067 Interim 

* 99 

* 85 

*249 

S1205 Btrieve Interface 

* 99 

* 85 


BTRIEVE ask about XTBIEVE & BTRIEVE 

Queen B-tree File Manager Abdicates Royalties 


T here's no Icxiger a tithe to incorporate 
Btrieve™ in appbcatxins, a welcome 
proclamation if ro^oes vrould rum your 
profit margins Btrieve takes ccxn{^ete 
charge of ^ Qe creation, indexing, 
reading, writing, insertion, deletion, space 
recapture, forward and backward searcii- 
ing It builds function call “commands” 
into the language you use: mterfaces 
to C Hiscal. BA^C and COBOL, with sam- 
ple programs in all four, ceme with each 
copy, 

Btrieve has mainframe specifications! hs 
balanced-tree indexing scheme finds any 
key in a million in four or less accesses 
Files may have up to 24 indexes, fixed 
record length to 4090 characters; indexes 
up to 255 characters, files erf 4 billion bytes 


Can even extend a file across two drives — 
even two hard disls' 

\fei5ion 4.x speeds mteraction for 
large multiply-keyed files enables 
vanable len^ records of virtuaUy any 
length; ven^ accuracy (c^Xionally) v^ 
read after wnta useful in gritty en- 
vironments offers password and data 
encryptxin 

Diere's also Xtneve, for Btrieve file in- 
quiry and data manijxilauon. and Rtneve 
for report wnting All three in versions for 
any network that supports the MS-DOS 3.1 
file sharing function 

Ask for List. PC Brand; 

S06S0 *250 *195 

S0652 Network Version *595 *465 


UeenMc: Each price ts tor a license lo use e prod- 
uct on a Single computer arid does not constitute 
Its ownership We mil inquire tor you atXHil site 
licenses Except as otherwise mr^cated or where 
*e/ tolows the Product Code, products may be 
used to creale programs tor distribution without 
royalty payments or additional licenses, provided 
satd programs do not substantially repticate the 
products themselves 

CeiiipeMtWty: PC BRAND’S standard products 
are designed to operate with the IBM * PC. XT or AT 
urtoerPC-DOS and require no more than t28kol 
RAM unl^ indcaied Non IBM machines using 
MS-DOS contactmanufactureraboulpreosedir- 
ferences so we can advise 
Relume: See box page one Detecbve parts wM be 
replaced Please call tor authorization to return a 
product tor refund 


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N«w disks rtcantly Mldad to our Hbraiy 
of usor>support#d snd puWlc domain 
softwaro for ttis PC: 

□ #471 P r es ent V5.1 Make your own slideshows 
for business or home using your odor monitor. 

□ #477 Name Orem/BreekDowrvFene Word 

Do ar^grams. Iirxl what words your phone number 
makes. 

□ #460 PC*Outllne Outline and organize 
information, much likeThinktank. 

□ #461 Still Mver Shell Makes DOS easy to use. 

□ #463 MeH Master Keeps track of multiple lists, 
sorts and prints by city, state, zip and name 

□ #465 Icon Maker artdFX-MatrU Makes 
graphics characters like the MAC for your screen 
and you can paint them on your EPSON printer 

□ #487 Reflei Point An action game modeled after 
the ROBOTECH cartoon series 

□ #492 Nutrient Tracks your diet and its calorie/ 
nutnent value 

□ #494.496.496 The WorM Digitized Find over 
100,000 different locations in the world and display 
them on screen 

□ #496 DOS-e-Medc Load different programs and 
manipulate them with single keystrokes 

□ #499 PNOCOMM Corrwnunicabons with 
XMODEM. KERMIT. A^ll protocols, supports IBM- 
3101, DEC VT52/1000, ADM-3 and ANSI 

□ #501 & 502 taiaaaye Tracks prospects, leads 
and memos and prnts letters with that information. 

□ #503 Relienee MelRng Lift Keeps track of 
multiple lists, sorts and prints by specific group- 
good for custom mailing. 

□ #506 BIbUegrephyefBusIneeeEthIceend 

MofelVWuee The regularly updated master 
Pbiography lor those doing papers and research 
involving business ethics. 

□ #507 PC Iprint Software and instruction on how 
to cheaply speed up your system 2-3 times 

□ #508 & 509 Statictlee Toole Factor experiments, 
‘FOflGET-lT‘ plots, simultaneous confidence 
intervals, randomization tests, expected mean 
squares. 

□ #510 Visible PASCAL CompHor Learn to 
program RkSCAL and watch the internal functions 
ol PASCAL as it runs- 

□ #511 TUrbo Sprites and Animetton Create, 
maintain and animate your own images in TURBO 
PASCAL 


RECENT DISK UPDATES 

□ # 5 PC-FHeVer 4 

□ # 76 PC-WMtoVer2.&1 

□ #124 Extended Batch Ver 2 04a 

□ #199 PC-CalcVer 3 

□ #212.334 RBBS-PC(2diSks)Vaf 3 7 

□ #368 lOOLstloreVer. 11 

□ #393 Checkbook Ver. 2 

□ #395 Ho«ne inventory Ver. 2 

□ #397 Checkbook Program Ver. 3.31 

□ #402 IBM 370 Cross AssomMor Ver 11 

□ #403 Computer Tbior Ver. 4.2 

□ #417 ADA Prolog Ver. 1.90 

□ #449 Gags Vers. 1.06 

□ #466 CPALedgerVer.11 

□ 350-page directory (disks 1-300) . $8.95 

□ Printed Supplement (disks 301 -454) $3.95 

□ 1 yr. PC-SIG Membership ($36 foreign) . $20 
Includes primed directory, supplement, bimonthly 
magazine 

SPECIAL 

Any 5 Disks plus 1 'YsBr M«mbBrsMp $39 

Disks are $6 each Add $4 postage and handling ($10 
foreign)- CA residenrs add state sales tax 

■fotal Enclosed $ by □ Check QVISA QMC 

Card No 


Exp. dale Phone. 


Name 

Addres s 

City Stale Zip. 


PC-SIG 


lb order, call. S00>245-S717 
In CA: S00-222-29BS 
For technical questions or 
local orders: (408) 730-9291 
1030-0 East Duane Avenue 
Sunnyvale. CA 94066 2t1 


b 


j 


CIRCLE 145 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


leach your 
oU word processor 
the newest tricks 

— I — “T^uiy amazing . . . outclasses every etiier pre- 
gram el its type.” —John C. Dvorak, S.f Examiner 
Feature loi feature, Webster's New Worlrt* On-Line Thesaurus 
leaves the competition at a loss lor words. With 20,000 tool 
words. 120.000 synonyms. 500.000 replacement alternatives, 
and much more (see our comparison chart below)— HfeOs/er-s 
New Work/w On-Line Thesaurus guarantees that you'll never 
be without the right word again. For the IBM PC, XT AT and 
PCir. $69.95 


The phenomenal software that catches complicated yet 
common misspellings — like "lenomenal." Just type in a 
word the way you think it sounds, like "polenshal." and the 
Spelling Chaker automatically corrects it lor you. Think of 
the potential that gives you! No wonder PC Magazine hails 
it as “the knock-down, drag-out, clear-cut 
winner!” (Editors Choice 1985) For the IBM PC. 
XT. AT PCjr and Apple It + , lie. and lie. $59.95 


LOOK HOW WE COMPARE: 


WEBSTER'S NEW WORLD* ON-LINE THESAURUS 




Webster’s 

New World 

Hirbo 

Lightning 

Rnndnm Home 
Referencd Set 

Root word entries 

20,000 

5.000 

5,000 

Root words + derivalives 

M.OOO 

5,000 

5,000 

Number of synonyms 

120,000 

50,000 

50,000 

Replacement alleinalives 

SOO.CXX) 

50,000 

50,000 

Woid'processors supported 

33 

ti 

14 

Resident RAM required 

44K 

64K min. 

24K min. 

Disk space required (full dictionary) 

360K 

160K 

208K 

Find synonyms for synonyms repeatedly 

y 

n 

n 

Undo synonym replacement 

y 

n 

n 

Backtrack through selections 

y 

n 

n 

Note pad 

y 

n 

n 

Multiple on-screen synonym pages 

i 

n 

n 

Edit synonym before insertion 

V 

n 

n 

WEBSTER S NEW WORLD' SPELLING CHECKER 



Wtbiler's 

New Wortd 
IBM, Apple 

hitbo 

Lightning 

IBM 

Randnm Houie 
Ralnranci Set 
IBM 

Number of words 

114,000 

83,000 

50.000 or 60,000 

Help windows 

y 

y 

n 

Browseable dictionary 

y 

n 

y 

Catches: 

Phonetic misspellings 

You type: FENOMENAL 

PHENOMENAL 

FELLOWMEN 

FEMININE 


SIMON & SCHUSTER COMPUTER SOFTWARE 

Now at your local retailer, or call toll-free todays 

1-800-624-0023 (National)1-B00-624-0O24 (In N.J.) 


WEBSTER'S NEW WORLD 
When Ever>^ Word Counts ' 

CIRCLE 370 DN READER SERVICE CARD 



weostersga 

NeuMbridH 

On-Line 

Thesaurus 






V I ll W [> () I N T S 


■ GUSVENDITTO 


PC ADVISOR 



Help for readers in making the right choices when speeding up a PC with a turbo card, 
in getting word counts on text files, and in shopping for a hard disk. 


AFASTERPC 

At the moment I do not need one of the 
new accelerator/turbo cards for the 
“slow" IBM PC, but I know that I will 
someday. I do plan to buy a memory ex- 
pansion card soon, and I want to know 
whether I should buy a "regular" PC 
memory card or one for the AT, with its 
faster memory chips? 

Gary Williams 

St. Augu.stine. Trinidad and Tobago 

Don’t buy an AT card for your PC — it 
won’t work. But you raise an interesting 
point. If an accelerator board uses an 
80286 chip or changes the clock speed to 
get a PC or XT running at A T -level speeds, 
why not take full advantage of the higher 
processing speed with faster RAM chips? 
The drawback is the slower ratings of the 
RAM chips already in your PC or XT. You 
can have only one memory-access speed, 
so the slowest chip in the system becomes 
the standard. Some turbo cards add wait 
states to slow down RAM accesses to the 
PC’s 200- to 250-nanosecond RAM range . 
The Overthruster (Nuclear Technologies, 
Fountain Valley, Calif; (714) 841-3336: 
$195 with a ¥20 chip) and the Fast88 (Mi- 
cros peed. Fremont, Calif.: (415) 490- 
I403;$I49, $l69witha V20) have jumper 
settings so you can set the elm k cycle to the 
fastest speed the RAM chips will allow. 

This limitation is completely overcome 
by the PCturbo286e (Orchid Technol- 
ogies, Fremont, Calif: (415) 490-8586: 
$1,195), the PC-elevATor (Applied Rea- 
soning. Cambridge. Mass.; (617) 492- 
0700: $1,195), and other hoards that re- 


place all the PC’s RAM (up to I or 2 
megabytes) with fast (120- to 150-nano- 
second) chips. That’s the best way to 
achieve the kiiul of .speed you’re looking 
for. Using faster RAMs can increase the 
machine’s overall speed by 10 to 15 per- 
cent, beyond the improvement from the 
turbo card. 


COUNTING WORDS 

Unaccountably, my WordStar 2000. so 
excellent in other respects, won't count 
words. Surely there must be a generic pro- 
gram somewhere that will count words in, 
say. ASCII fdcs. I am very much a novice, 
have essentially zero programming skills, 
and have no access to bulletin boards. 

James Morrison 

Encinitas. California 

Word counts are one of the fringe benefits 
you get with many spelling-checker pro- 
grams. Webster's New World Spelling 
dtecker (Computer Software Division. Si- 
mon <S Schuster. New York, N.Y.: (212) 
245-6400: $59.95) and The Random 
House Proofreader (Digital Marketing 
Corp., Walnut Creek. Calif. (800) 826- 
2222: $50) are among the programs that 
will give you the.se and otherfeatures, such 
as word-frequency totals. They’ll work on 
any ASCII text file . 


DOUBTING IBM 

My wife and I own an IBM PC and have 
decided to install a hard drive. The article 
“Courting Disaster: The IBM PC AT” in 
the April 29 issue of PC Magazine (Vol- 
umes Number 8) has caused us to question 


the reliability of all IBM internal hard 
drives. Please clear up any misconceptions 
we might have and enlighten us with the 
names of generic hard disk drives that 
would be compatible. 

Dennis L. Edge 

Pearland, Texas 

The crashes plaguing AT hard disks have 
no correlation with PCs, )CTs, or any other 
IBM product. The problems almost cer- 
tainly stem from the particular combina- 
tion of disk drive and disk drive controller 
used in the AT. It svould be a mistake to 
avoid other IBM products because of this 
isolated problem with CMl’s AT hard 
di.sks. On the other hand, it would be fool- 
ish to overlook the wide range of internal 
hard drives sold through mail-order 
houses: they’ll prove to be Just as reliable 
at a much more congenial price. Tandon, 
Shugart, and Priam are among the makers 
of dependable, economical internal hard 
drives. For easier installation (at a higher 
cost), consider hard disk cards from 
Mountain Computer, Western Digital, or 
Plus Development. The best way to shop: 
call several mail-order houses or visit 
nearby retailers, explain exactly how your 
system is configured, and .see what they 
recommend. Make sure they offer the level 
of technical support you think you’ll need. 
Then order the product you feel most com- 
fortable with. 


ASK THE ADVISOR 

Send your questions to The PC Advisor, 
PC Magazine. One Park Avenue, New 
York. NY 10016. [fi 


C MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
25 



Bulldog Is Saddlin’ Up 
Summer Specials 


PC SYSTEMS 

256 K, 2 Drives $1250 

256 K, 2 Drives Monochrome Monitor and Card 1489 

256 K, 2 Drives Color Monitor & Card 1689 


XT SYSTEMS 

256 K, 1 Drive, 10 mb Hard Disk $2050 

256 K, 1 Drive, 20 mb Hard Disk 2150 

256 K, 1 Drive, 10 mb Hard Disk Monochrome Monitor 

&Card 2289 

256 K, 1 Drive, 20 mb Hard Disk 

Color Monitor & Card 2575 

AT SYSTEMS 

AT BASIC 256 K, 1.2 mb Hoppy $2995 

512 K, 20 mb Hard Disk 1.2 Roppy 3395 

512 K, 20 mb Hard Disk 1.2 Roppy Monochrome 

Monitor & Card 3825 

512 K, 30 mb Seagate Hard Disk 1.2 Floppy 3750 



Take hold of your future 
with AT&T 6300 PC. Now 
you can get all the features 
and speed you need at the 
right price. All AT&T Sys- 
tems include Keyboard, Bit 
Image Graphics, Green 
Monitor, 256K DOS, and 
On-Board Clock Calendar. 


2 Drive System $1795 

10 mb System 

.2095 

20 mb System 

.2170 

Upgrade to 640K, 

75 

AT&T Color 


Monitor add.... 

...575 



MONITORS 

QUADRAM EED 

-$515 

NEC MULTISYNC 

559 

Princeton Taxan Amdek 

MAX 12 159 121GorA139 300G 129 

HX12....459 620 395 300A 139 

HX12E 515 630 450 310A 159 

SR 12 585 640 495 600. 

410 

1 

500 

SOFTWARE 

IBM DISPLAY WRITE III 

$369 1 

WORDSTAR 2000 

...249 

WORDSTAR 2000-E 

...279 

WORD PERFECT 4.1 

.209 

MICROSOFT WORD 

.239 

VOLKSWRITER III 

.159 

FREELANCE 

...219 

CROSSTALK 

109 

WORD FINDER 

49 

SUPER CALC 

189 

LOTUS 1 2 3 

329 

SYMPHONY 

429 

DBASE 11 

259 

D BASE m-t 

399 

FRAMEWORK 

399 

FANCY FONTS 

135 

REVELATION 

575 

MULTIMATE 

239 

CLIPPER... 

349 

R BASE 5000 

339 

ENABLE 

349 

MICROSOFT WINDOWS 

79 

EASY 

89 

FAST BACK 

99 

CHARTMASTER 

23Q 

BORLAND - BORLAND - BORLAND 

TURBO PASCAL 

$43 

TURBO LIGHTNING .. 

69 

REFLEX 1.1 

99 

TRAVEUNG SIDEKICK 

59 

GAMEWORKS 

43 

TURBO TOOI ROX 

an 


HA!» DRIVES 

Seagate 10 mb w/cont 

$395 

Seagate 20 mb w/coht 

...475 

Seagate 30 mb w/cont 

...550 

Seagate 30 mb for AT ST4038 

635 

Seagate 40 mb for AT ST4051 

725 

Core Internationa) 20, 30, 40, 

56,72, mb 

ZAIL 

Iomega Bernoulli 



1385 

10 -F 10 

1995 

20 + 20 

2550 

Mountain 20 mb drive card.... 

.849 

Western Digital 10 mb hard card 

....559 

Western Digital hard card 20 mb 

....625 

Priam 60 mb AT 

1195 

Priam 43 mb AT 

1949 1 


T Shipping & Technical Call: l>404-868-5081 
For Orders Call: 1 •800-438-6039 
n Georgia Call: 1-404-860-7364 


Bulldog 

Exercises 

Low 

Prices 



C=fl .§■ 



GENOA EGA $299 

GENOA SPECTRUM 199 

QUADRAM EGA 369 

STB CHAUFFUER 249 

STB EGA PLUS 349 

SIGMA COLOR 400 449 

SIGMA EGA 379 

HERCULES GRAPHICS 289 

PERSYST BOB BOARD 349 

AST 6 PACK W/384K $209 

RAMPAGE FOR AT w/512K 445 

INTEL ABOVE BOARD for PC w/256K 

Expandable to 2 mb 375 

INTEL ABOVE BOARD for AT w/512K 

Expandable to 2 mb 575 

ADVANTAGE w/128K 349 

IRMA BOARD 769 

J RAM III by Tall Tree for PC w/o K 210 

J RAM III by Tall Tree for AT w/o K 249 

J LASER 350 

ORCHID CONQUEST 279 

AST 5251-11 PLUS 615 

MAYNARD ACCENT w/o K 199 

QUADBOARD w/o K 179 



U 

ON 

JS 

u . 
« 5 ; 

5 ® 

(A 

a 

u W 

* £2 

2 • 

« s 

3 04 

JS 

U 


(A 

a • 
G) 00 

CM 

a’^ 


GRAPHICS EDGE 

$239 

U 

THE EDGE 

219 


MAGIC CARD II w/384K 

179 


MINI MAGIC w/o K 

69 


300/1200 INTERN/U. MODEM 

165 


60 m.b. TAPE BACKUP for AT Internal... 

799 

(A • 

External 

849 


RAM 3000 w/oK 

175 

u S 


LX 80 


EPSON 


LX 90 

239 

FX85 

369 

FX 286 

489 

LQ 800 

469 

LQ 1000 

689 

RX 100 

359 

DX 10 Daisywheel 

209 


DX 20 Daisywheel 

DX 35 Daisywheel 

OKIDATA 

182 

183 

192 

84 P 

193 

2410 

292 

293 


321.. 

351 

341 

351 Color.. 


TOSHIBA 


289 

589 

229 

379 

349 

649 

499 

.1729 

539 

669 

459 

.1025 

769 

.1199 


360 KB Floppy for AT $105 

1.6 mb Floppy for AT 145 

IRWIN 10 mb Tape for PC 

Internal 495 

External 595 

Genoa Galaxy 60 mb 

Internal 799 

External 935 


HAYES 1200 369 

HAYES 1200 B 339 

comes w/Smart Com 

HAYES 2400 External 575 

HAYES 2400 Internal 525 

US ROBOTIC COURIER 2400 or 

MICROLINK 2400 439 

VENTEL HALF CARD 349 

VENTEL 1200 PLUS 339 


CIRCLE 480 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



Bulldog — A Product Of 
Good 


Sales Hot Line 


Washington Road • Marthics, Goirgla 30907 


g Computer 



A MEGABYTE FOR DOS! 


MicroWay is the worlcfs leading retail- 
er of 8087s and high performance PC 
upgrades We stock a complete selec- 
tion of 8087s that run from 5 to 12 
MHz. All of our coprocessors are 
shipped with a diagnc^ic disk and the 
best warranty in the business - one 
year! We also offer daughterboards for 
socketless computers (NEC PC) and 
287Turbo which increases the clock 
speed of the 80287 from 4 to 1 0 MHz. 
Our NUMBER SMASHER/ECM" runs 
at 12 MHz with a megabyte of RAM 
and achieves a throughput of .1 mega- 
flops with 87BASIC/INLINE, Intel For- 




tran, or Microsoft Fortran Software re- 
viewers consistently cite MicroWay 
software arxf 8087 expertise as the 
best in the industry! Our customers fre- 
quently write to thank us for recom- 
mending the correct software and 
hardware to meet their specific needs 
They also thank us for our same-day 
shipping! In addition to our own prod- 
ucts which support the 8087 and 
80287, we stock the largest supply of 
specialized software available For 
more information call us at 

617 - 746-7341 


NUMBER SMASHERf'ECM" 
THE FASTEST ACCELERATOR 
CARD AVAILABLE 

gives you 1 2 MHz speed in two modes 
704K or one megabyte of “Extended 
Conventional Memory.’ MEGASWITCH 
MMU and MegaDOS software make it 
possible to nin DOS applications with 
up to 1 01 5K using PC compilers, Autd 
CAD and Lotus 1-2-a Does not re- 
quire EMS software Totally compat- 
ible Priced from $599 with 51 2K to 
$1199 tor complete package Option- 
al 8087-1 2 ... $295 



SPEED UP YOUR AT 
OR AT COMPATIBLE 
WITH 287TURBO' 10 MHz 


Mi 


'icro 


8087 Support 

For the IBM PC, PC XT, PC AT and Compatibles. 


A2D-160'* 

performs 1 60,000 1 
sions per secondf li 
fastest 1 2 bit A to D board avallabia For the IBM 
PC XT aixf compatibles. $1 295 

87SFL” MicroW^s Scientific Function Li- 
brary contains 1 70 scientific arxl er^ir^eehng funo 
tiona Callable from most 8087 compatible com- 
pilers . . . First Language $250; Additionai $1 00 

MATRIXPAIC managesa MEGABYTEl 
Written in assembly language, our njntime pack- 
age accurately manipulatesbi^ matrices at very 
fast speeds. Include matrix inversion and the 
solution of simultaneous linear equations. Call- 
able from RM or MS Fortrar\ MS Assembler, or 
87BASIC/INLINE each $99 

BTFFT- Written in asserTt>ly language, per- 
forms Forward and Inverse FFTs on reel a^ com- 
plex arrays v^ich occupy up to 512 Kbytes of 
RAM. Also does convolutiorrs auto correbtions, 
hamming complex vector multiplication, arxf com- 
plex to radial conversions. Callable from nx^st 
8087 compatible compilers $200 

87FFT-2’" performs two-dimensional FFTs 
Ideal for image processing R^iF88 87FFT$100 

FASTBREAK'” employs the 8087 to in- 
crease the speed of Lotus 1-2-3” Version 1A or 
1A*byupto36:1 $79 

87Vortfy^ Foruserswhohavetobeabsolutely 
sure of their results! This backgrourxl task perioch 
ically performs an 8067 accuracy arxf stress 

test $49 

Microeoft Fortran V 3i31 $209 

IBM Profession^ Fortran $565 

Ryan-McFaiiarxf Fortran V 2.0 $399 

NAG Fortran Library $300 

Qrafmatic for Fortran or Pascal $125 

MuttiHalo Graphics (1 larrauag^ $189 

LABTECH NOTEBOOK $745 

UnkelScope $540 

INTEL ABOVE BOARD CALL 

JRAM, AST MAYNARD CALL 


_ The only Intel-Lotus EMS board 
whicF comes with two megabytes of cooNunning 
low power drain CMOS RAM installed Includes 
RAM disk, print spooler disk cache; arxf EMS driv- 
ers. For the IBM PC, XT& compatibles $549 

MegaPageAT/ECC* EMScaidforthePC 
AT and compatibles includes Error Correction Cir- 
cuitry. With ECC. 11 RAMchip6Cover256Ksothe 
userneverencountersRAMerrofsWithl megabyte 
CMOS $799; with 3 me^bytes CMOS $^5. 
Optior>al seri^parallel daughteiboard $95. 

DFUer Our disk utility which thoroughly 
checks PC or AT hard disks for bad sectors and 
updates the MS DOS file allocation table accord- 
ingly. Solves the AT hard disk problem! ...$149 


pOptimizer" 


Optimizes the way your hard 
IS its files Speeds up accesses 


Micro 

l/\lay 


RO. Box 79 
Kingston, Mass 
02364 USA 
(6171 746-7341 


disk or floppy stores its files 
by recombining fragmented files $49 

DCache"* Our disk cachlr^ software speeds 
up your I/O by storing rc^ltiveiy used tracks In 
memory. The amount of memory used can be 
selected in 64 Kbyte banks $49 

STMACRO/OEBUG" Contains all the 
pieces needed for writing 8087/80287 assembly 
code & MicroWays 87DEBUG debugger. $199 
OBJ -'ASM'” A multipassobfect module trar^ 
lator arxf disassembler. Produces assembN lan- 
guage listings which include public symbol ex- 
ternal symbols and labels commented with cross 
refererx»s. Ideal for patching obfect modules for 
which source is not available. $200 

87BASIC’” includes patches to the IBM BASIC 
or MS Quick BASIC Cornpiler for USER TRANS- 
PARENT 8087 support Provides super fast per- 
formance for all numeric operations including trig- 
onometrica transcerxJentais, addition, subtrac- 
tiorx muttiplicatio(% and envision each $1 50 

87BASiC/INUNE'” converts the output of 
the IBM BASC ConrtpUer into optimized 8087 
inline code which executes up to seven times fast- 
er than 87&tSIC Supports separately compiled 
inline subroutines which are located in their own 
segments and can contain up to 64 Kbytes of 


oode This altq^ programs greater than'l28KJ 
1 BA9C Compiler Version 1 and 
5 87BASIC. 


Requires the IBM 
a Macro Assembler. Includes 


$200 

MICROWAY UDI mns RTOS or RMX com- 
pilers under DOS $300 


8087 UPGRADES 

All MicroWay 80878 irKlude a one year warrar^. 
complete McroWay Test Program and accurate 
installation irtstructions 

8087 5 MHz $109 

For the IBM PC. XT arxf compatibles. 

8087-2 8 MHz $149 

For Wang AT&T. DeskPrc; NEC, Leading Edge 

80287-3 5 MHz $179 

For the IBM PC AT arxl 286 compatibles. 

80287-6 6 MHz $229 

For 8 MHz AT compatiblea 

80287-8 8 MHz $295 

For the 8 MHz 60286 accelerator cards 

NECV20, V30 $16, $30 

64KRAMSet150na $10 

256K RAM Set 150ns $29 

256K RAM Set 120ns $39 

128K RAM Set PC AT. $49 

287Turtx>~ 10 MHz If you own an AT, 
Deskpro 286 or AT compatibly this is the card you 
need to get reasonable numeric performanca It 
plugs into your 80287 socket and includes a spe- 
ciaiiy driven 1 0 MHz 60287. The card comee in 
three con^urationa The IBM AT verson indudes 

a hardware RESET button $450 

287Turbo8MHz $369 

87/88Turt»' is a stubby card which indudes 
a clock calendar and a sp^ controller which 
changes the speed of your motherboard from 477 
to 7.4 MHz. Its use requires your PC to have a 
socketed 8284. Typical speed increase is 1.6 to 
2.0 The card overcomes slow hardware by slow- 
ing up only when such devices are accessed and 

running at full speed otherwise $149 

Optional 8087-2 $149 

286TurtX)Cache'' This new Micn>Ws» so 
celerator uses 8K of cache memory and 602 ^/ 
80287 processors to pro^ride an average speed 
increase of 3:1 for most programs Call for 
specifications and berx:hmarKs $595 

Call for our complete catalog of 
software which supports the 8087. 

In London, piMto phono 223-7762 




AT performance at an XT prica 

I MTOducmgtheTeleCAr- 286 . 

$2995. Complete. 



• N-k^Uh-i 


WTithl^eVrideo, 
you always setOe for more. 

For some timei youVe known 
exacttywiiat kind of PC you could 
get with a mid-range budget. 

But now, you can setUe for 
a wiiole lot more. With the new 
TeleCAT-286,” fiom TeleVideo. 

It starts you off with IBM AT 
compatibility. 5 1 2K RAM. A 20MB 
hard disk. A 1.2MB floppy. And 
eveiything else you ne^. Like an 
Intel 80286 CPU that runs at 
either 6 or 8 MHz. Even a high- 
resolution 640 X 400 pixel 
monitor for text and graphics. 


To make even better use of 
internal space, we socketed the 
TeleCAT-286 for one MB of RAM, 
and also included serial and 
parallel ports on the motherboard. 
As a result we can still give you 
three extra expansion slots. 

And we didn’t stop there. 
We've also designed more ergo- 
nomic features into the TeleCAT- 
286. Including sculpturpd key- 
caps on a high-quality keyboard. 
LEDs right on top of the three 
critical locking keys, so they won't 
get covered up by overlays. And 
a footprint that's 28% smaller 


than the IBM APs. So you get 
more of your desk back, too. 

There's a lot more we could 
say about the TeleCAT-286. But 
it's an even better idea to get 
your hands on it. So call lT 800 ) 
TELECAT Dept. 112, and we'll 
tell you where you can try one. 

TheTeleCAT-286. Our 20MB 
version is $2995; 30MB, $3495. 
For high pierformance at a low 
price, don't settle for less. 

^ l^l^deo’ 

Settle for more. 


TeleVideo Systems, Inc., 1 170 Morse Avenue, Sunnyvale, CA 94088-3568 • (408) 745-7760 

C1966TeleV^ideo Systems. Inc IBM is a regteteredtradenuric of IniematlonaJBuaneH Machines, inc Soeen graphics by ChanmaflerCOediion Resources, Inc 


CIRCLE 346 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




Our new improvements on 

Crosstalk XVI are f ev o lu t i o n c c r y l ee l e ss o li* 

oonoatioma U ... too good to ignore entirely. 



It's not easy to make big improvements to Crosstalk. So we 
keep making little ones. To some people, our latest im- 
provements may seem minor. But they may be just what 
you've been waiting for. 

If you need the KERMIT protocol, you'll be excited to hear 
that our new version of Crosstalk XVI has it. Now you can 
transfer files from PC to mainframe or back, with error- 
checking. 

If you use TopView, you'll be happy to hear that our new 
version is compatible with it. You can now keep Crosstalk 
running while you use another program. 


In all, our latest version of Crosstalk XVI has 30 im- 
provements. Some minor. Some major. 

If you already have an earUer version of Crosstalk, we'll 
update it for a modest additional charge. 

If you use another data communications program that 
doesn't keep improving, maybe it's time you had an im- 
provement of your own. Try Crosstalk, at your local retailer. 
Or write for details. 

MICROSTUFi Woods Pkwy. 

vri J Georgia 30076 






CIRCLE 325 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


CROSSTALK is a regisiered trademarlt of Mlcrosiuf. tnc 







16 


mM DISPLAYWRITER to IBM 5520 to 
S/36 to IBM 8100 to IBM PROFS to W 
VS to CPT to LANIER to NBI to MIQPlVEio DEC 
XEROX to UNOLEX to COMPUGRAPfflC to 
to NCR to DEC VAX to CP/M to DATA GE 
UNIVAC to BURROUGHS to HONEYWELL to 

FLAGSTAFF ENGINEERING can connect your incompatible computer 
systems using diskette, tape, communications, or printed media. We 
have developed many low cost systems to help you transfer files and 
documents between different computer systems. Our "FILE", 

"WORD", and "TYPESETTING CONNECTION" products can read 
and write most of your 8", S'A", and SVi" diskette formats. The 
"PROTOCOL CONNECTION" can provide RS232 communications 
between your different computers. The "TAPE CONNECHON" 
system is a 9-track tape drive that can read and write your files on 
800, 1600, or 6250 BPI magnetic tape. Since 1982, we have installed 
thousands of conversion systems at customer locations around the 
world. Call us today for help in connecting your systems. 


toW 


IB 


Flagstaff 

Engineering 

1120 W. Kaibab 
Flagstaff, AZ 86001 
Telephone 602-779-3341 
Telex 705609 FLAGEN 


CIRCLE 180 ON READER SERVICE CARD 





\ 1 (; I s 



First Looks 



3370-TYPE HEADS 
(on« per surlace) 


HEAD-MOUNTING CARRIER 


[light SOURCE 


[s^flORl 


OXIDE PLATTERS 




The $S95 Plus Hardiard 20 is the smallest andfastest20-megahyte hard disk card on the market. Its 43-miUisecond access time puts the speed ofan AT hard disk in a PC' or XT. 


lhider-$ 600 PCs: 
Worth tiK Price? 


II \M)S()\ 


THE PC+ offers a 
surprisingly sturdy 
one-drive system 
unit for $507. 

BYJOEDESPOSITO 

You can buy an IBM PC forjus! 
under S2. 000. well-known 
compatibles such as Tandy and 
Epson for $1 .000, and. if you're 


willing to go with a lesser- 
known brand, a dozen or more 
personal computers are avail- 
able for $500 to $600 for the ba- 
sic system unit with one disk 
drive. 

To see how budget PC com- 
patibles stack up on reliability 
and performance. PC Magazine 
Labs took a look at one of the 
least expensive units, the new 
$507 THE PC+ from Thomp- 
son, Harriman & Edwards 
Computer Products Co. (THE), 
an affiliate of the Chicago- 


based PC Network mail-order 
house. The THE PC+ is adver- 
tised at $469 for the system unit 
with 640K bytes of on-board 
memory, keyboard, and one 
360K-byte floppy disk drive 
and controller, but since there's 
an 8 percent markup for anyone 
other than dealers, the price 
comes to $506.52. 

A single floppy disk drive 
unit with a monochrome/graph- 
ics monitor would be $672 — not 
much more than IBM's or- 
(continued on next page) 


Plus Shoehorns 20 Mbytes 
Onto a Single^t HaPdeard 

m 


II \ MIS ON 


BY CHARLES BERMANT 
Plus Development Corp.. 
which shipped (he first 10-me- 
gabyte hard disk on an expan- 


BeloH'. a light source, deflected by a front-surface 
mirror, shines through a scored slide to a photo detec- 
tor to provide the track reference points. 


sion card in October 1985, has 
enhanced (he Hardcard with a 
20-megabyte version, the $895 
Plus Hardcard 20. 

The Plus Hardcard quickly 
generated a field of imitators. 
27 at last count. Plus says. 


While Plus isn't the first at 20 
megabytes, it may be the best. 
Compared with the competi- 
tion, (he new Plus Development 
drive is generally faster, thin- 
ner, less power-hungry, better 
{continued on next page) 


HANDS-ON tNDEX 

mpc+ 

Well-built, affordable $507 
PC-compatible system 
unit 33 

PLUS HARDCARD 20 

A 20-mcgabyte, 43- 
millisecond single-slot hard 
disk card for $895 33 

AT TURBOSWITCH H 

Frequency synthesizer that 
allows PC ATs to run at 6 to 
12.5 MHz 35 

SHOWPARTHBR 

An affordable presentation- 
graphics program with 
screen animator ... 36 

POtllTFtVE 

Calculating and analysis 
tool that beats spreadsheets 
at some tasks .... 38 

TSENG LABS, 
PC^SUMITEDEGAS 

1 32<olumn mode for Tseng 
Labs, $269 price for PC's 
Limited......! 46 

HEKUUS 

eiUPHICS CARD PLUS 

Puts text, graphics, 
on same screen .... 51 

ABOVE BOARD PS/AT 

An Intel EMS board for the 
PC AT with both parallel 
and serial ports .......... 52 


Hardcard 20 uses /hv J‘/i-inch cohalt-doped oxide 
platters and four read-write heads, below. Head actu- 
ator is driven by voice-coil servo system. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
33 


I IhinnOT'onrHir 








^ I R S I 


1. () () K s 


TTuB ENCHMARK TESTS 


The PC+ vs. IBM PC XT 


TNCPC-i- M Harddisk Floppydisk 
IBM PC XT disk Ftoppydisk 


Disk Input/Output 


512 bytes 578 bytes 


A> results are m seconds. 

















y 




i 

f 







1 




n 



' •' 

1 



-| 

1 

s- 

£1 






.0.^0 

til 

i 

S-l 


















•9 



1 








1 









-g 

1-a 

s 

1 



1 




i 

2 - 

flE; 

IH 

tl 

} 


n 



Prime Number 
Calculation 

50 j— I 1— 47CX3“l 

40 I I * ‘ 


I 



Compiler 

Routine 

375 I , 1 , 

310 32 319 66 
300' 



The Disk Input/Outout benchmark test measures the time K 
takes to create a 200K-byle data Me using record lengths of 512 
bytes and 578 bytes. The lest program then performs a random 
read of 256 reooras from the created data Me. loltowed by a 
sequential read of the aama records. 

The Prime Number Caiciilettona benchmark lest meoauros the 
speed at (Which the computer can And al the prime numbers 
b o t(w oe n 1 and 50. 

The C o m ptl a f Routine benchmark test assesses the speed of 
program d o w o lopment in the micfoprocessof and RAM by (wy of 
a two-step, self^ning DOS batch Me using the IBM Petsonaf 
Conipuiar Urikar program. Stage 1 takes a 341-Hne assembly 
Me (.ASM), converts II to binary code, and Ink-edits k (^ 
other biniry Mes to make an eMscutabie (.EXE) Me Stage 2 
conipie s and inks source code to resotve address references 
and make an eaocutabte Me. 


ThedBASE Routine benchmark teat tor database applicaiions 
assesses how quicMy the machine rMde Mid writes to dtok by 
pertotTriing a series of disk-inieneive dSASE fi. version 2.^ 
tasks. The setf-Uming DOS batch Me runs a total of six dSASE 
roulineaonSi individual database records cor— ting of tS4 bytes 
each; sorting on adatabese Me (.DBF), indexing on zoftfie 13 
d— fields in each record, copying to a temporary database Me. 
settir^ two indexes on a do labose Me. a ppericing a record, and 
deleting a record arxl packing (or removing the data hole from) 


The 1-3-3 Routine benchmark test for apreadahaei appicaiiona. 
desanedtora640K-byieenvironmeni,aeseMeelhecornput8- 
lionM speed and RAM management capabilities of the machine 
byusinga f -2-3 macro that performs a aeries of both global and 
indivkkjal (worksheet tasks, the macro copies and recalateles a 
IDoell range 499 ernes, moves 1.000 ceis, deletes 1,000 cels, 
and then systemMically deem (he spreadaheeL 


At H MHz. the $507 THE PC runs suhsiantiaUy faster than a stock IBM PC. hut some tusks only work at 4. 77 MHz. The PC Sys- 
n uses QumePt>ppy disk drives and the ubiquitous Seaxate ST ‘225 harddisk. ($4l6t. 


THEPC+ 

(continued from preceding page) 

phaned PQ> — or $753 with two 
drives. 

Added to the basic system 
that we tested was an EGA dis- 
play board and a Seagate 20- 
megabyte hard disk. 

Speeds; 4.77 and 8 MHz 

The THE PC + runs at either 
the usual 4.77-MHz clock speed 
of the IBM PC and PC-XT or at 
an increased speed of 8 MHz 
(keyboard selectable with Ctrl- 
Alt-Minus). At 8 MHz, the 
THE PC+ ran some PC Labs 
benchmark tests as much as 40 
percent faster than the IBM PC. 
However, the benchmark test 
for floppy-disk speed would not 
run when the system was in the 
8-MHzmode. Also, normal op- 
erations such as formatting a 
floppy disk would not work at 8 
MHz. 

Otherwise, the THE PC + 
performed without a mishap. 
We ran 1-2-3, XyWriie, and oth- 
er software and noticed no com- 
patibility problems. 

The system unit is solidly 
built, with a steel cover and 
chassis, a 135-walt power sup- 
ply. eight expansion slots (like 
the XT), and five ROM sockets 
(like the PC) — only one of 
which is populated. Many of the 
chips are socketed rather than 
soldered in. 

The keyboard layout resem- 
bles the original IBM AT key- 
board. The keys have a light re- 
sistance to the touch, but it's 
fine for typing. 

Options Already Installed 

The THE PC+ units ordered 
through PC Network come with 
options, such as video display 
cards and hard disks already in- 
stalled. according to THE's 
president. Steven Dukker. 
Thai’s not the case with all bud- 
get PCs. Additional benefits are 
a 45-day money-back guarantee 
and I -year warranty, plus cus- 
tomer and technical support 
lines. 

There is always an element 
of risk involved when you shop 
for the lowest-priced product, 
but in this case there appears to 
be enough of a safety net with a 
guarantee and warranty to make 
the risk worth taking. ■ 


I^F A C T 
m F 1 L E 


THE PC-F 
PC Network 
319 W, Ontario Si. 

Chicago. II. 60610 
(312)280-0002 
List Price: With (vtOK RAM. 
one floppy disk drive. S.507; 
with Aniber+ monitor, mono 
graphics card. S672; second 
360K floppy disk drive. $81; 
20-Mhyie hard disk . controller. 
WI6; EGA card. $259. 

In Short: The THE iswdi 
built and has enough company 
support behind it to make it a 
very attractive alternative to 
higher-priced competition, 
CIRCLE 423 ON READER SERVICE CARO 


HARDCARD20 

(continued from preceeding page) 

integrated, sturdier, and only 
modestly more expensive. 

The Hardcard 20 is the same 
width (I inch) as its year-old 
sibling and fits into one expan- 
sion slot, while competitors arc 
as much as iy4 inches wide and 
take up two or one and a half 
slots (a half-card can go into an 
adjacent slot). It uses just one 
printed circuit board, and the 
dual-plaller. four-head Malsu- 
shita-madc drive employs a cus- 
tom-designed spindle motor to 
save space and power. It draws 
8 watts — a 3-walt improvement 
over the original. 

The Hardcards use rotary 
voice-coil technology for 
speedy head positioning. Plus 
Development rates the average 


access time of the Hardcard 20 
at 49 milliseconds; it was 
benchmark-tested in the PC 
Magazine Labs at 43 millisec- 
onds using the Core Internation- 
al speed lest. Thai's fast — al- 
most the equal of the PC AT’s 
40-millisecond drive and twice 
as fast as slock PC-XTs. which 
average 85 to I iO milliseconds. 
In comparison, five of the first 
hard disk cards tested by PC 
Labs (see “Hard Disk Cards; 
An Expensive Solution Worth 
Considering," PC Magazine, 
Volume 5 Number 6) ranged 
from 60 to 1 59 milliseconds. 

Installation 

Like the 10-megabyte ver- 
sion, the Hardcard 20 has its in- 
stallation software on the disk 
and works with all versions of 
DOS from 2.0 on. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
34 





FIRST 


L () O K S 


Under-$600PCs 




Distributor and 

Model 

Coat 

RAM 

(Kbvtftsl BIOS 

Faatacct 

WIttM 

DntoXT 

$465 

640 

Erso 

4.77/8 Mite, 

Intel 8088-2 

ConipMiart 

FouirlainXT 

$499 

256 

Fountain 


Mknl 

MIcnIXT 

$499 

640 

Arc 


SfMmSCoiFantloii 

SysUinSXT 

$499 

256 

Erso 


TME/PCNetwort 

PC+ 

$507 

640 

Antex 

4.77/8 MHz, 

Intel 8088-2 

47tkSt.Ptioto 

XT Compatible PC 

$549 

256 

Fountain 


PCSowca/CompoAiM 

Standard-tS 

$549 

640 

Phoenix 


TWasaflMIcra 
' Canialtiag 
1elesottXT/2S6 

$559 

256 

lelesan 


CamputarDynarics 
Dynamic XT 

$595 

640 

Erso 


HveSt.r 

FivaSt*rXT 

$595 

640 

FiveSUr 

4.77 MHz. 

Intel 8088-2 

Qaantek Carp. 
QuaatekXT 

$595 

256 

Triex 


Talatoft Micro 
CootalHnt 

TUeton XT/640 

$596 

640 

Telesoft 


IBM 

IBM PC 

$1,845 256 

IBM 

5 expansion 
slots 

Except where noted ell machines include system unit with eight expan- 
sion Kots. keyboard, 4.77 MHz, 6088 processor, and ona 360K-byta 
floppy disk drive but no monitor or monitor card. Prices are as of June 

1986. 

Chin iCKanrhed by Gietcben Luchsii^ 


Ai Ifosi a dozen companies, mostly mail order, offer PCs for less than $600. while 
brand names are $1 .000 or more. ForoMyrkingPC, you need to add a monitor, moni- 
tor card. and DOS. Street prices IBM PCs are often lower than listed here. 


Plus Development claims the 
Hardcard 20 can handle up to a 
100-G-power-off impact and 10 
Gs with the power on. The 
heads park automatically when 
the power is off. 

One Drawback 

The only drawback to the 
Hardcard 20 stems from the per- 
manent link between drive and 
controller, so it can't be used in 
PC ATs with their combined 
floppy/hard disk controllers. It 
will, however, woric in a hard- 
disk-equipped XT if you want a 
second Winchester, or two 
Hardcard 20s can work side by 
side in a PC. Also, Plus guaran- 
tees its Hardcard 20s will work 
only with the most IBM-com- 
patible machines: the Compaq, 
the AT&T PC 6300. and the 
Olivetti PC M24. ■ 


'IH F A C T 

'file 


Plus Hardcard 20 
nus Develc^Mnent Corp. 

1778 McCarthy Blvd. 

Milpitas. CA 93035-7421 
(408)946-3700 
Ust Price: $895. 

In Short: Plus Development’s 
rugged new 20<Mbyte version 
of its Hardcard is the thinnest (1 
ittch) and fastest (43-inillisec- 
ond average access time) 20- 
Mbyte hard disk card yet. For 
IBM PCs and XTs (not avail- 
able for ATs) and close compa- 
tibles only. Sets the standud for 
the next generation of hard disk 
cards. 

OnCLE aaa ON READER SERVICE CAM) 


TurtmSwitch Lets ATs 
lteach8to12.5IVBb 


H ANDS ON 


BY WINN L. ROSCH 



When IBM found PC AT users 
were swapping the speed-gov- 
erning crystals on their ATs to 
make them run faster than the 
factory-specified 6 MHz for as 
little as $15 (see ’’Making Fast 
Faster,” PC Magazine. Vol- 
ume 4 Number 23, page 1 36), it 


The $125 AT 
TurhoSwitch II 
has three ICs, 
sewn resistors, 
three capaci- 
tors. one transis- 
tor. and three 
switches, hal- 
lows ATs to run 
asfastas 12.5 
MHz: most will 
hit B to W MHz. 


changed the ROM BIOS to lock 
the AT in at 6 MHz. But not any 
longer. 

The AT TurboSwilch II of- 
fers a way around the restric- 
tions. This $124.95 aid replaces 
the standard AT crystal with a 
variable frequency synthesizer 
that mimics crystals giving 
speeds of 8 to 12.5 MHz in half- 
megahertz steps, plus 6 MHz. 

You can change the speed of 
the computer from outside the 
case and switch back to a default 
speed of 6 MHz to install copy- 
protected software or run speed- 
sensitive programs. 

The AT TurboS witch II in- 
cludes a reset button to allow 
cold boots without turning the 
system off and on. for those 
times when the system is hung 
up so badly the Ctrl-Alt-Del 
warm boot won’t work. 

12.5 MHz Unlikely 

In practice, most ATs will 
not run at the 12.5-MHz limit. 
You determine the optimum 
speed by increasing clock speed 
until the system crashes. The 
AT used in the PC Magazine 
Labs test reached 9 MHz. Typi- 
cally, the AT TurboSwitch II 
will increase processing speed 
by about a third. 


Installation requires tapping 
into the 80287 numeric co- 
processor socket, the crystal 
socket (after the crystal is re- 
moved). and the power supply. 
Two of the connections are 
made with clip-leads; if one of 
them slips off, the system crash- 
es. The unit mounts in an un- 


used cutout in the AT's back 
panel and looks just as if IBM 
had designed it in (it makes you 
wonder why IBM didn’t). 

Although no soldering is re- 
quired, installation cannot be 
recommended to novices. The 
terse instructions may baffle 
anyone who isn’t familiar with 
IC pin numbering and other cir- 
cuit conventions. ■ 


ATTarboSwitdiU 
Megahertz Cc»p. 

2681 Parieys Way. Bldg. 2-102 
Salt Lake City. 11X84109 
(801)485-8857 
UK Pita $124.95. 

Requires: IBM PC AT. 

In Sbert: A frequency synthe- 
sizer that affords all PC ATs die 
ability to nm from 8 to 12.5 
MHz (in half-megahertz steps), 
as well as 6 MHz. Includes a re- 
set swi^ fw odd boots without 
powering down. Installatioa is 
straightforward but not for nov- 
ices. 

CIRCLE ear ON READER SERVICE CARO 


PC MAGAZINE 


AUGUST 1986 


PhcMupiph : Thom O'Cc 






FIRS I I. 0 (> K S 


Show Partner Mixes 
Graphics, Animation 


rrc! 


H ANDS ON 


BY WINN L. ROSCH 

IBM’s PC Storyboard changed 
the world of on-screen presenta- 
tion graphics with animation, 
moving and changing screen 
images under PC control. Now 
IBM’s year-old market-leading 
presentation animator has for- 
midable competition in Show 
Partner, a product of the 6'/:- 
year-old PC software company 
Brighibill-Roberts and Co. 

As with PC Storyboard, 
Show Partner adds life to pre- 
sentation graphics by generally 
speeding screen updates and al- 
lowing fractional screen parts to 
be independently changed. It 
buffers a full graphics screen 
and quickly switches between 
images. In addition, Show Part- 
ner allows the quick creation of 
images with a graphics editor 
and presentations with its 
unique auto-build feature. 

Four Primary Programs 

The Show Partner package 
consists of four primary pro- 
grams, most with easy-to-use, 
pull-down menu interfaces: 

• CAPTURE Is a resident 
program that allows you to save 
any image appearing on a PC 
monitor to a disk file so that it 
can be edited and incorporated 
into a presentation. 

• SP presents a template for 
designing presentations. It per- 
mits several varieties of transi- 
tions from screen to .screen to be 
selected: simple replacement of 


one screen (or portion) with an- 
other. wiping along either 
screen axis or diagonally, a two- 
screen interweave, fading, and 
nearly smooth scrolling. The ef- 
fects can be assigned three 
speeds, and display limes for 
each screen can be set from in- 
stantaneous to 90 seconds (or 
until a key is pressed). 

• SHOW is a small (15K- 
byte) run-time module that will 
display the presentation from 
the commands created with SP. 
SHOW can be distributed with 
presentations without royalty. 

• SPGE is a memory-resi- 


dent graphics editor (essentially 
the same as Brightbill-Robcrts’s 
well-known GraFIX Partner) 
that operates like a paint pro- 
gram (such as PC Paintbrush or 
Dr. Halo) and can change size, 
alter color, and rotate, move, 
and draw on any screen image. 

In addition, a small clip-art 
library, 20 type fonts, and dem- 
onstrations are included. 

EGA Supported 

Show Partner opxjrates with 
all standard IBM graphics 
adapters, including the IBM 


Color Graphics Adapter, the 
IBM Enhanced Graphics 
Adapter, and the Hercules 
Graphics Adapter. Most display 
modes are supported, as well as 
the highest-resolulion multicol- 
or modes. Instead of using sepa- 
rate drivers, however, the pro- 
gram determines for itself what 
monitor and color display abili- 
ties are available and adjusts it- 
self accordingly. 

For hard-copy output. Show 
Partner will drive any of about 
60 printers and the Polaroid Pal- 
ette film recorder. 

Although it still has a few mi- 


nor(nonfatal) bugs. Show Part- 
ner has a more friendly interface 
and a more powerful editor and 
supports a wider range of hard- 
ware than the IBM product. 

“Our only competition is 
IBM’s PC Storyboard," says 
Stephen T. Brightbill. president 
of Brightbill-Roberts. “We let 
IBM create the market for us.” 

As if that were not enough, 
the success of Show Partner is 
assured even without retail 
sales. More than 200.000 
copies have been ordered for 
bundled distribution with vari- 


Show Partner operates with all 
standard IBM graphics adapters, 
including IBM’s Color Graphics and 
Enhanced Graphics Adapters, and the 
Hercules Graphics Adapter. 



FACT 

FILE 


Show Partner, Verskm 1.2 
Brightbill-Robens and Co. Ltd. 
120 E. Washington St.. #421 
Syracuse. NY 13202 
(315)474-3400 

List Price: $79 until August 31. 
$ 1 49 afterward; $30 for GraFIX 
Parmer owners. 

Requires: Show Partner Ani- 
mator 256K RAM; EdibM^ 
lOOK RAM; Minimum require- 
ments; 32QK RAM with CGA. 
640K with EGA. two flt^y 
disk drives or hard disk. 

In Short: Presentation graphics 
screen animator with image- 
capturing software, memofy- 
residenl graf^ics editor, and 
royalty-free run-time module 
that supports a wide variety of 
hardware. Similar to and more 
affordable than IBM’s $250 PC 
Storyboard. This program is not 
copyprotected. 

CIFCIE 428 ON READER SERVICE CARO 


ous hardware products, includ- 
ing the AST ColorGraph Plus 
display adapter. Thomson mon- 
itors. and Kodak’s System 10 
LCD presentation display. 

Although Show Partner 
should find wide applications in 
presentation graphics, it has far 
greater capabilities. One hint of 
its potential is PC Life, an ani- 
mated. disk-based computer 
video magazine that features in- 
teractive graphics based on 
Show Partner roxn'ines. The sys- 
tem should al.so prove useful for 
training and instructional mate- 
rials where colorful animated 
action is needed to keep a 
drowsy audience awake. 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
36 









Before you buy DBase 
HI, QuMfCode and 
aipper, look at 
TAS-Plus 

TAS-PlusJust made it taster, easier and 
cheaper to buiid database appiications. 
TAS-Pius combines the power of a 
Relational Database with the ease of a 
Program Generator. Then TAS-Plus adds 
a Runtime Compiler to produce 
lightning-fast finished code. 

Look at what TAS-Plus gives you: 

Relational Database 
4th Generation Language 
Screen Painter 
Program Generator 
Report Writer 
Source Code Editor 
Runtime Compiler 

TAS-Plus gives you power where it 
counts. You can store up to 65,000 
records, open up to 16 files at a time and 
enter up to 10,000 charaaers per record. 
TAS-Plus even reads your old DBase files. 


TAS4HUS 
wHtesthe 
program 
foryou 

With TAS-Plus, you can start building 
professional database applications on 
day one. Just "paint" the screen the 
way you want and TAS-Plus writes the 
program for you. You can even paint 
using different colors or graphic 
characters. And custom reports are just 
as easy. 

TAS-Rus has over 86 commands and 
200 options available in its Source Code 
Editor, so you won't run out of room to 
grow. 

Easy to use features 

Add new databases quickly and easily. 
Add, change or delete records without 
any programming at all. 

Browse through your database and see 
multiple records on the screen at the 
same time. 

Restructure capability allows you to 
change existing databases without loss 
of any data. 


TA 


NOT COPY-PROTECTED 

YES' Ruah mt Mowing iMa 

Oty. Kern Price 

tea 


Shipping add $8 USA. 
125 outside USA 
WA res add $5-59 Tax 


Shipping . 
Tax 

Amount Enctosed . 
(US tunds only) 


Shipping Address: . 


City: 

State 

Telephone . 
Paymern; 


Order Tbday 
1-B0ad4Bd258 


Call our Toll-Free Hotline. Use wur 
VISA, MasterCard or American Express 
to order today. For information or 
Vl^shington residents call I-206-644-20IS. 


BUSINESS 
STOOLS 
INC. 


The following are registered trademarks ot these companies; 
TAS-Plus. The Accounting Solution. Business Tools. Inc; 
DBase III. Ashlon-Tate; CP/M, Digital Research: IBM PC/XT/AT, 
International Business Machines Corp: OuickCode, Fox&- 
Gilier, Clipper, Nantucket Inc 


‘ Copyright 1966 Business Tools, Inc 


All this for Just ‘69 

TAS-Plus would be respeaable at any 
price, at S69 it's awesome. 

30 dsiy Money Back Deal 

TAS-Plus comes with a 30 day money 
back guarantee (iess S15 handling fee). 
TAS-Pius is available for the IBM 
PC/XT/AT and fully compatible 
computers. Limited versions available 
for CP/M and non-IBM machines. 


Credit Card Expiration Date; 
Card Number: 


Name on Card; | 



BUSINESS TOOLS INC. 
4038-B 128th Ave. S.E., Suite 266 
Bellevue, Washington 98006 
|206) 644-2015 



CIRCLE 472 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


FIRS I I. () O K S 


Point Five: A New 
Of Looking at Numbers 


Mg H ANDS ON 


Better than 
spreadsheets for 
some scientific, 
statistical uses. 

BY RICHARD AARONS 

The spreadsheet enabled mil- 
lions of managers, academics, 
and engineers to look at num- 
bers in an entirely new and effi- 
cient way. Now a pnxluct that 
holds promise of marking yet 
another milestone in the way we 
use PCs to examine numbers 
has been introduced by Pacific 
Crest Software: Point Five. 

What Point Five di>cs is easi- 
er seen than described, but basi- 
cally it's an interactive mathe- 
matical scratchpad that supports 
calculations, statistical analy- 
sis. modeling, graphics, and ap- 
plications development. 

BASIC has an interactive 
calculator mode: for instance, 
you type "? .^1.5 * 8” and BA- 
SIC answers “252". Pinnt Five 
works in a similar fashion but is 
vastly more powerful. It sup- 
ports 150 functions — financial, 
statistical, graphical, matrix, 
and sensitivity, as well as han- 
dling basic data manipulation. 

According to Dan Apple, 
president and founder of Pacific 
Crest Software. “We created 
Point Five to overcome users' 
frustrations with the cumber- 
some mechanics, limited func- 
tionality. and confining struc- 
ture of conventional programs. 
We wanted a t(K>l that would be 
fast, flexible, and respon- 
sive — a ttH)l that lets users struc- 
ture a problem one way. take a 
look at the results, and then re- 
structure it quickly for a differ- 
ent type of analysis.” 

The illustration shows the 
Piiint Five sciccn. The lower 
portion is the scratchpad, where 
formulas are entered and edited. 
Answers appear on the lop 



Point Five formulas are entered and edited on a scratchpad on the bottom half the 
screen, with ansycers scrol/in/( up the tftp half. The $195 program supplies 150 math, 
statistics, and finance functions: for some applications, it’s superior to a spreadsheet. 


.screen, .scrolling up from the 
screen break. 

Matrix Analysis 

Point Five variables can rep- 
resent a single data element or a 
two-dimensional table of data 
elements. A table variable can 
be used anywhere a single data 
element cun be used, so musses 
of data can be manipulated with 
a single command or in a func- 
tion or procedure. Obviously, 
matrix analysis is one of Point 
Five's strong features. 

In a typical application, a 
user creates and loads variables, 
then manipulates these vari- 
ables with constants to produce 
interim results that arc posted 
above the scratchpad. The user 
always has an audit trail and can 
go back to edit an earlier expres- 
sion. 

A block of work can be 
marked as an application or sub- 
routine to be used again in the 
current worksheet or transport- 
ed to other Point Five work- 
sheets. 

Point Five makes use of the 
function keys for catling help 
screens, invoking the editor, 
and making full and partial 
copies to disk. It also uses sev- 
eral Alt-key combinations for 
word-proccssor-slylc block, 
copy, and cut-and-movc com- 


mands. (These commands are 
used to move formulas around 
just as they are used to move 
words or phrases in a word pro- 
cessing environment.) 

On-disk Help 
Point Five's on-disk help is 
good but not context sensitive. 
If you cun define your help 
needs at the command level (for 
example, .seeking help for a spe- 
cific statistical function). Point 
Five will lake you directly to the 
appropriate help page. Other- 
wise. you arc prompted to step 
through a scries of poinl-and- 
shoot menus to get to the page 
you need. 

Documentation comes in 
three parts and is excellent: it is 
well written, has good graphics, 
and — most important — offers 
thorough explanations of Point 
Five functions. A 68-pagc tuto- 
rial. which can take 2 or ^ hours 
to complete, demonstrates 
Point Five's major features. 
There is also a lesson file on the 
distribution disk. 

An important clement of the 
documentation is a ISO-pagc 
reference manual: its first sec- 
tion covers Point Five's opera- 
tional features, while the bulk of 
the manual is devoted to an in- 
depth explanation of each of the 
150 functions. 


Room for Improvement 

While the core of Point Five 
is in good shape, some of the pe- 
ripheral features need help. The 
graphics portion is not as pow- 
erful as that of standalone pro- 
grams. the use of color is nil 
outside of graphics, and there's 
no way to import or export files 
to and from 1-2-3 worksheets. 
However, Point Five can read 
and write ASCII and DIF for- 
mats. 

During our review, PC Mag- 
azine showed Point Five to 
three technical types — a techni- 
cal writer who spends hours dai- 
ly crunching numbers for re- 
ports. an aviation sales 
engineer, and a law enforce- 
ment statistician. All work with 
spreadsheets daily. They played 
with Point Five's tutorial for 
about an hour and then tried 
their own applications. 

Each of the three found Point 
Five has an intuitiveness about 
it that makes on-the-fly calcula- 
tions (the old paper-and-pencil 
thinking technique) much easier 
than they were in the spread- 
sheet environment. The infor- 
mal technical panel also agreed 
that while Point Five docs not 
pose a direct threat to Lotus's 
/-2-3 and other spreadsheets, in 
the future serious spreadsheet 
users may turn to Point Five for 
heavy-duty analysis. 



FACT 

FILE 


Point Fife 

Pacific Coast Software Inc. 

887 NW Grant Avc. 

Corvallis. OR 97330 
(503)754-1067 
Ust Price: $195 
Requires: 256K RAM, two 
floppy disk drives. Supports 
8087/80287 coprocessor. 

In Short: A free-form 
calculating environment that 
supports multidiniensional 
variables and provides 1 50 
math, scientific, statistical, and 
financial fimetions. A new way 
of looking at numbers; for some 
applications, better than a 
spreadsheet. Not copy 
protected. 

CIRCLE 421 ON READER SERVICE CAflO 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
38 





Maynard Itas A 
little Surprise 
For IBM PC Users. 



"Maynard's Surprise iunips the PC's speed to 2.6 
on the Norton SI scale! That’s over 2'/! times its 


Surprise^ Maynard’s new high-speed board increases 
your IBM PC’s* speed up to 2V2 times, and 
^ doesn’t take up an expansion slot! 


‘I just calculated my Lotus spreadsheet in a 
fraction of the time it used to take! Maynard's new 
Surprise is fast!” 



“I installed Maynard's Surprise even though I 
didn't have any expansion slots lofti Was! 
surprised! Now my PC’s faster than ever!" 


’IBM PC and XT are trademarks of IniernatkKial Business Machines. Compaq to 
andamarkol Compaq Computer CorporUion. NCfl is a trademark of NCR 
Corporation Prices lor Compaq and NCR Modal 4 are sighdy higher. 



suggested 
retail price 


• increases PC speed up to 2'A 
times! 

• doesn't use an expansion slot! 

• installs in seconds! 

• works with the IBM PC and XT, 
Compaq, and NCR Model 4*! 

• surprisingly low cost! 



Available at the finest computer stores. 


CIRCLE 478 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


! Maifnaid Electronics 

Shaping tomorrow’s technology. 

460 E. Semoran Blvd., Casselberry, FL 32707 305/331-6402 




Computer* and Communtcotion* 


Your first color monitor should 
be good enough to be your last. 


SEC introduces the only 
color monitor you need. 
Superb resolution plus 
Multisync for across-the- 
board compatibility with all 
three PC graphics boards 
made by IBIVif for business 
graphics, CAD/CAM, 
computer art, and text. 

Now there’s one high 
resolution color 
monitor that does 
, things your way. 

^ The Multisync™ 
monitor from NEC. 

It gives you the 
best color resolu- 
tion available at 
the price. 

• Compatibility with the IBM 
Professional Graphics 
Adapter, the IBM Enhanced 
Graphics Adapter, and the 
IBM Color Graphics Adapter. 




Kn 


iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii 

1 


M U S Y N 


The Intelligent Monitor' 



• Multisync, the NEC 
feature that automatically 
adjusts to color adapter 
board scanning frequencies 
from 15.75 KHz to 35 KHz— 
suggesting the possibility 
that the Multisync monitor 
might be compatible with all 
color graphics boards that 
are fully compatible with the 
IBM PC, PC/XT, and PC/AT, 
now and in the future. 

p Full implementation of 
high resolution graphics 
software for business and 
other applications, now 
and in the future. 

• And color capability 
limited only by the board 
being used. 

See Things Our Way 
Until now, you had to choose 
different color monitors for 


compatibility with all three 
PC color graphics boards 
made by IBM. With so many 
board and monitor configura- 
tions, folks didn’t know which 
way to look. 

The new MultiSync color 
monitor gives you unique 
compatibility. As well as TTL 
and analog color. With 7 
switchable text colors. And 
resolution up to maximum 800 
horizontal dots and maximum 
560 vertical lines, on a large, 
13" diagonal viewing area. 

All that, priced at just 
'c $799. All from NEC, a 
name respected around 
the world for advanced, 
reliable products backed 
by nationwide service. 


It’s the one color monitor that 
does everything your way. 


Compath 

bility with 

the IBM* 

Color 

Graphics 

Adapter 

Board 






But why talk more about it? 
Visit your nearest dealer and 
see a graphic demonstration 
of the new NEC MultiSync 
monitor’s capabilities. Then 
draw your own conclusions. 

For information dial 

h800-44^4700 


NEC HOME ELECTRONICS (U.S.A.) Inc. 
Personal Computer Division 
1401 Estes Avenue 
Elk Grove Village. IL 60007 

NEC 


CtRCLE 178 ON READER SERVICE CARD 







Conceived on a Mainframe. 
Bom on an AT 


Ask a CPA about accounting software for PCs, 
and chances are he'll recommend an accounting pack- 
age with multiple modules. If the package runs under 
PC-DOS, it probably won’t support multiple users... 
at least in terms of supporting multiple users within 
each module. 

But ask him what would be ideal for your organiza- 
tion, and he'll probably tell you that a true multi-user 
accounting sy^em would be perfect. 

Until now, this kind of system couldn’t be found... 
couldn't run under PC-DOS, and couldn’t run on 
hardware other than minis and mainframes. That is, 
until NetProfitT“ 

NetProfit™ Will Change The Why Vbu TMnk 
About Accounting Softwara...Fora««r. In use on 

large systems for over eight years, NetProfit™ enables 
you to use your accounting database as a powerful 
decision-making tool. 

Financial reports can be user-customized. You 
can group accounts together, such as multiple check- 
ing accounts, and combine data from up to 99 com- 
panies, branches, or divisions. 

Because the system is designed for multiple 
users, accounting files and records can be shared 
among all users and departments— with three levels 


of security and password protection. 

This means that salespeople using Orders t 
Invoicing can be continually updated by Accounts 
Receivable regarding a customer's sales and payment 
history. In addition. Inventory can keep Sales appraised 
of the availability and current cost of goods. 

Up to 30 Simultaneous Users Unilor PC-DOS... 
With 72 or More Able to Access the System. For- 
get everything you've ever heard about the limitations 
of accounting software for the IBM PC. When combined 
with MultlLInk® Advanced or LANLinkI" NotProfIt™ 
becomes a multi-user, multi-tasking accounting system 
that runs under PC-DOS 3.1 and better. 

Running under MultlLink^ Advanced, Inexpensive 
terminals connected to host PCs, XTs, and AT s can be 
used as workstations in the system. 

Don’t Be Held Single-User Accountable. For 

complete details about the NetProfir” Multi-User 
Accounting System and the authorized dealer nearest 
you, contact The Software Link today. 

NetProfit™ is immediately available at a cost per 
module of $795. Evaluation disk available. Complete 
satisfaction is guaranteed or your money will be 
promptly refunded. VISA, MC, AMEX accepted. 


THE SOFTWARE LINK, INC./CANADA 

400 Esna Park Drive. Suite 18, Toronto (Markham). Ont. L3R 3K2 

CALL: 416/477-5480 

MultiLink* is a registered trademark ot 

The ^ftware Link, Inc. NetProfrtTM LANLinkTM 

and MultiLink AdwKedTM are trademarks ol 

The Software Link. Irw. 


THE SOFTWARE LINK, INC. 

Developers of LANLInk™ & MultiLink* Advanced 

8601 DunwoodyPlace. Suite 632 Atlanta, GA 30336 
Telex 4996147 SWLINK 




IBM. PC. XT. ATa PC-OOS 
are trademarks of IBM Corp. 


CALL: 404/998-0700 
Dealer Inquiries Invited 

CIRCLE 393 ON READER SERVICE CARD 






QuadEMS^h 

The Only Memory Board 

ForYourPC-XTWith 

BothEMSandEEMS. 




Memory And I/O 

QuadEMS+ delivers 2Mb RAM when 
you move up to expanded memory. 

And supports both expanded memory 
specifications: EMS and EEMS. Each is 
independently engineered into the 
board. Plus, there’s a printer port, 
communications port, and clock/ 
calendar to enhance your system. 

Memory Only 

If all you’re after is memory, 

QuadEMS+ also comes without I/O. 
Pure RAM. Either way, QuadEMS+ lets 
your system take advantage of the power 
of expanded memory without worrying 
about compatibility problems that 
might crop up later. 

So Smart, It Installs Itself 

Available now for your PC-XT and XT 
work-alikes, QuadEMS+ is easy to use. 
Just plug it in. It does the rest. It’s 
desimed to automatically configure 
itself to your system requirements. For 
more information visit the Quadram 
dealer nearest you. Or contact us at One 
uad Way, Norcross, Georgia 3CX)93; 

‘ -5566. 


Qua 


-564-! 


QusdEMS'' tsfl tradcrrurk of Quadram Ctwy. Quadram . 
Quadram kiiRi are rcvatercNl rrademarks ot Quadram Coi 


and the 
Corp. 


QUADRAM 


CIRCLE 189 ON READER SERVICE CARD 






What can you expect for $1000? 


As prices for PC-compatibles come down, 
your chances of buying a lemon go up. The 
fact is, a lot of seeming bargains can turn out 
to be expensive traps. 

That's not to say a reliable, full-featured 
PC for $1000 is impossible to find. You just 
have to know where to look. And what to 
look for. 

At PC Designs, we've built a reputation of 
knowing where to look for the finest, most 
reliable components and offering them in 
easy-to-assemble kits. The result has always 
been higher performance at a lower price. 

Even at $995 complete, our new PC is no 
exception. 

The Plain Truth 

We call our new XT-compatible The Plain 
Vanilla ... an honest computer at an honest 
price. But don't be fooled by the name— or 
the price. The Plain Vanilla outperforms any 
other computer in its price range, and some 
costing a lot more. 

Listen to what Paul Bonner of PC Wfeek had 
to say about The Plain Vanilla: '! . . at $995. 
The Plain Vanilla represents an incredible 
bargain for a standard XT-compatible!' 

So what do you get for $995? 

Pure Performance 

• IBM PC-XT compatible BIOS 

• 640K on-board RAM 

• Intel 4.77 MHz 8088 Microprocessor 

• 135-watt 110-220 VAC power supply 


• TWo DS/DD floppy drives with controller 

• High-resolution amber monochrome 
display 

• Monochrome graphics compatible display 
card 

• "Switchable" AT-style keyboard 

• TWo parallel ports, two RS232 serial ports 
and game port 



Actually, there's a lot more. Like a built-in 
clock/calendar with battery back-up. 
support for an optional 8067 math co- 
processor. RAM disk software, a print 
spooler (along with several useful public 
domain programs) and a hinged, metal XT- 
style case with six expansion slots. 


It^ Complete 

As with all PC Designs products. The Plain 
Vanilla comes to you complete (a lot of PCs at 
this price are just skeletons — you have to add 
a monitor or a keyboard or a graphics board or 
. . .you get the idea). 

If you should want to expand your system, 
let us know. Wb have a full line of exciting pe- 
ripherals at equally exciting prices (How ex- 
citing? Call us and we'll tell you in detail). 

In fact, if you'd like to enhance The Plain 
Vanilla right away, order it with a 20 mega- 
byte hard disk for just $1,495. 

Call Us Now 

One thing is as plain as day: There's a lot of 
demand for a PC this good at a price this rea- 
sonable. So call us now at our Iblsa head- 
quarters and order your Plain Vanilla. And 
remember to ask about our 30-day risk-free 
policy and our one-year warranty. 

The Plain Vanilla from PC Designs. It's just 
plain incredible. 


PcIiBBEBEi 

11105-B East 56th St. 

TUlsa. Oklahoma 74146 
(918)252-5550 


CIRCLE 372 ON READER SERVICE CARD 





Msnf Caids Expand: Express 
Systems Offers Seven Mod- 
els, fromZOtoSOMliftes 

Express Systems has taken the 
hard disk card concept into new 
realms of mass capacity. It of- 
fers seven models in its Hard 
DiskCard series: the $449 
20AT — which is a 20-mega- 
byte. 60-millisecond unit de- 
signed to work with the PC AT 
and compatibles; the 2060 and 
2080 ($595 and $495, respec- 
tively) — 20-megabyte. 60- and 
80-millisecond units for the PC 
and XT; the 3060 and 3080 
($795 and $695) — 30-mega- 
byte, 60- and 80-millisecond 
units; the $995 4080 — a 40-me- 
gabyte, 80-millisecond unit; 
and the record-setting 6060 — a 
60-megabyte. 60-millisecond 


Fife Recofery Programs 
Prom Two Companios That 
Challango Morton 

Two companies have followed 
Peter Norton Computing in try- 
ing to make money off other 
people's mistakes. 

Westlake Data Corp.'s 
$49.95 SafetyNet is a memory- 
resident program that catches 
files as the user erases them, 
moving them into a hidden di- 
rectory. SafetyNet' % main menu 
lists all files in this hidden direc- 
tory so that they can be easily 
expunged or called back. 

Capitalizing on the problems 
h2-3 has with partially dam- 
aged files is Spectrum Com- 
puter Consulting with its 
$49.95 Rescue. Rescue collects 
undamaged portions of a dam- 
aged spreadsheet (from both 
Releases lA and 2) into a new 
spreadsheet, getting around 
7-2 -i’s inability to read in dam- 
aged files. 

List Price: SafetyNet, $49.95. 
Requires; 4K RAM. We.stlake 
Dala Corp. . P.O. Box 1711. 

Austin, TX 78767; (5 12)474-4666. 


CIRCLE 439 ON READER SERVICE CARD 

List Mce: Rescue, $49.95. 
Requires: J28K RAM. Spectrum 
Computer Consulting, 9 BunJitl 
Rd.. North Reading. MA 01864; 
(617)644-0337. 


CIRCLE 440 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


unit that sells for $ 1 ,095. 

All models draw 1 1 watts 
from the power supply and oc- 
cupy 1 V 2 expansion slots, with 
the exception of the 4080 and 
6060, which each draw 20 watts 
and lake up two slots. All mod- 
els include Auto DiskSave back- 
up software. 


Torrance, Calif.-based Ep- 
son America has pulled a 
fast one with its 80-coIumn 
EX-800 — a nine-pin print- 
head dot matrix printer. Op- 
erating at a claimed print 
speed of 300 characters-per- 
second draft and 54-cps near 
letter quality, the EX-800 
lists at $749. 

Rexibility and ergonom- 
ic features are abundant on 
the EX-800, Including an 
eight-button panel that lets 
users switch easily among 
eight typestyles (draft, pica, 
elite, normal, roman, NLQ 
sans serif, proportional, and 
condensed); a bidirectional 


List Prices: 20AT. $449: 2080, 
$495; 2060. $595; 3080, $695; 
3060, $795; 4080, $995; 6060. 
$1,095. Express Systems Inc., 
1254 Remington Rd.. 
Schaumburg. IL 60195; (3 1 2) 882- 
7733. ext. 3600; (800) 341-7549. 
ext. 36(X)(outsidelll.). 


CIRCLE 432 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


push-feed tractor; a "zero 
tear-off capability that pre- 
vents waste of pages or num- 
bered forms when printouts 
are removed; and automatic 
single-sheet alignment. 

The EX-800 accepts both 
Epson and IBM control 
codes, has an 8K-byte buff- 
er, and comes with a l-year 
warranty. 

List Price: EX-800. $749. Ep- 
son Anterica, Computer Prod- 
ucts Div. . 2780 Lomita Blvd. , 
Torrance, CA 90505: (213) 
539-9140, (800) 42 1 -5426 (out- 
side Calif.). 


CIRCLE 42a ON READER SERVICE CARO 


Votan Voice-Mail System 
Recognlies Voices, 
Supports 400 Users on XT 

Voice-recognition technology 
has always been the specialty of 
Fremont, Calif.-based Votan. 
Now Votan has incorporated its 
technology into a voice-mail 
system that, after only a few 
minutes of "training." will rec- 
ognize voice commands over 
the phone. The Votan Voice- 
Mail system is sold as a turnkey 


Modem Optloas MuNMIt: 
Phe Makers tatreduee 
Models vrltk lam Prices, 
Imwvatlve Features 

Modem makers are saturat- 
ing the communications 
market with products that of- 
fer more features than ever at 
better prices than ever. 

Leading Edge Products' 
$149.95 half-card Model 
'X" is a Hayes-compatible 
1,200 bit-per-second mo- 
dem that includes BrrCX)M 
software. 

Prentice offers its $325 
P212ZX 1 .200-t^ external 
modem, which is compati- 
ble both with the Hayes stan- 
dard and with Prentice's 
POPCOM family of mo- 
dems, and includes automat- 
ic voice/data switching. 

Anderson Jacobson's 
$599 AJ 2412-AD3H is a 
standalone Hayes-compati- 
ble 2.400-bps unit that fea- 
tures several security op- 
tions and a 25-number 
auto-dialer. 

OmniTel's Encore 2400 
HB is its $399 entry into the 
2,400-bps, half-card inter- 
nal market. The Encore 
2400 HB is compatible with 
all industry transmission 
standards, but not the Hayes 
command set. and includes 
BITCOM software. 

Data Race's $1,495 
RACE Tower upright exter- 
nal modem (not Hayes-com- 
patible) has a claimed trans- 
mission throughput of 1 .000 
error-corrected characters 
per second (equivalent to 
about 10.(X)0 bps) using data 
compression. 


EpsoN's $749 EX-900 
80-column dot-matrix 
printer prints at speeds of 
uptoSOOepsand 
features push- 
button control 
over type styles. 



HOT PROSPECT 


Epson’s EX-Sin Nine-Pin Dot Matrix 
Printer Offers Speed, Ease ef Use 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
44 





tins 


[. (M) k S 


package containing an IBM XT, 
hard disk, voice-recognition 
cards, and software. The system 
allows up to 400 users to record, 
send, and distribute messages 
on a $19,450 four-channel sys- 
tem with 60 megabytes of mass 
storage. 

List Price: Two-channel. 30- 
Mbyte VoiceMail system. $10,950; 
four-channel. 60-Mbyte system. 
$19,450. Voian, 4487 Technology 
Dr. . Fremont. CA 94538; (415) 
490-7600. 


CIRCLE 43S ON READER SERVICE CARD 



Data Race's $1,495 RACE Tower mo- 
dem's LCD displays line-ifuality anal- 
ysifi. The Tower has a small footprint. 

List Price: Model "L", 

$149.95. Leading Edge Prod- 
ucts Inc. . 225 Turnpike St. , 
Canton. M A 02021; 

(800) USA-LEAD. 


ORCLE 433 ON READER SERVICE CATO 

List Price: P2I2ZX. $325. 
Prentice Corp. , 266 Caspian 
Dr.. P.O. Box 3544, Sunny- 
vale. CA 94088-3544; 
(408)734-9810. 


ORCLE 434 ON READER SERVICE CARO 

List Price: AJ 241 2- AD3H. 
$599. Anderson Jacobson Inc., 
521 Charcot Ave.. San Jose. 

CA 95131; (408)435-8520. 


CIRCLE 435 ON READER SERVICE CATO 

List Price: Encore 2400 HB. 
$399. OmniTel Inc. . 54 1 5 Ran- 
dall PI., Fremont, CA 94538; 
(415)490-2202. 


CIRCLE 435 ON READER SERVICE CARO 

List Price: RACE Tower, 

$1 .495. Dau Race Inc.. 5839 
San Sebastion PI . , San Anto- 
nio, TX 78249; (5 1 2) 692-3909. 


CIRCLE 437 ON READER SERVICE CARO 


Multifuoctiott Cants Cel 
Increased Functions 

Board makers are putting more 
and more functions on single 
cards. 

American Computer & 
Peripheral’s AboveFunction 
Card has ports, a battery-backed 
clock/calendar, and up to 2 me- 
gabytes of expanded RAM. 

Unlvation's Dream Board 
includes the I/O ports and RAM 
and also adds an 8086 coproces- 
sor that brings your PC or XT up 
to a 10-MHz clock speed. 

IDEAssociates' $1,795 All 
Aboard has I/O ports. 2 mega- 
bytes of expanded memory and 
a clock, and adds an EGA-, 
CGA-, and MDA-compatible 
display adapter and a hard disk 
controller. 

List Price: AboveFunction Card 
with OK RAM. $380; with 2 Mbytes 
of RAM. $820. American 
Computer & Peripheral Inc.. 2720 
Croddy Way. Santa Ana. CA 
92704;(714)545-2004. 


CIRCLE 441 ON READER SERVICE CARO 
List Price: Dream Board with OK 
RAM. $795; with 5 1 2K RAM . 
$995. Univation Inc., 1231 
California Circle. Milpitas. CA 
95025; (408) 263- 1 200. 


CIRCLE 442 ON READER SERVICE CARO 

List Price; All Aboard. $1 .795. 
IDEAssociates. Inc.. 35 Dunham 
Rd.. Billerica. MA0182I;(6I7) 
663-6878. 


CIRCLE 446 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


$39.95 Spreadsheet: The 
Thinker Includes 1-2-3 
Functions 

The craze for low-cost 1-2-3 
clones has hit rock bottom, 
price wise. TexaSofl’s $39.95 
The Thinker is not an exact 
clone, but TexaSoft claims that 
it supports all the math, statisti- 
cal. and financial functions of 
1-2-3, Release I A. The Think- 
er's spreadsheet size is only 26 
columns by 125 rows, and it 
doesn't import .WKS-format 
files, but it will read in .DBF or 
DIF flies. 

List Price: The Thinker, $39.95. 
Requires: I28K RAM. TexaSoft 
Inc , P.O. Box 1 169. Cedar Hill. 
TX 75104; (214)291-2115. 


CIRCLE 443 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
45 



Zenith s$2.399Z-t8l Portable RC fea- 
tures a backlit electroluminescent LCD 
screen. 640K bytes of RAM, and two 3'ri- 
inch floppy disk drives . Note the bright- 
ness and contrast controls for the screen : 
also note the placement of the driws. 


Toshiba 

ZooithZ-181: 12-pom'd “Ciamsheii," TwoD] 

Two major laptop portable 
players have enhanced their 
offerings. 

The only quibbles PC 
Magazine Labs had with To- 
shiba America's $1,995 
TIIOO portable PC CDOS 
to Travel." PC Magazine, 

Volume 5 Number 13) con- 
cerned its single instead of 
dual 3’/2-inch disk drive con- 
figuration, its 300-bit-per- 
second instead of 1 ,200-bps 
Hayes-compatible internal 
modem, its 512K-byte in- 
stead of 640K internal 
RAM. and its unusual func- 
tion-key and number-key 
layout (with two half-rows 
for each). With the introduc- 
tion of the $2,399 TIIOO 
Plus. Toshiba has addressed 
and resolved every one of 
these complaints. 

The TI 100 Plus is based 
on Intel’s 80C86 micro- 
processor and operates at 
clock speeds of either 4.77 
or 7. 16 MHz. Its display 
screen is the same as that of 
the Tl 100, but Toshiba 
claims that a new display 
adapter handles color-to- 
gray-scale conversions bet- 
ter. An enhanced disk-drive 
interface can connect to To- 
shiba’s external SlA-inch 
floppy disk drive, or it can 
connect to a desktop ma- 
chine for drive-sharing. The 
function and number keys 
are laid out along the top of 
the keyboard in separate 
rows. The TIIOO Plus 
weighs 10 pounds — 1 pound 
more than the Tl 100, which 



Toshiba's $2 .399 T 1 100 Plus laptop fea- 
tures 640K bytes of RAM. a 1.200-bit- 
per-second modem, an enhancedfunc- 
tion-key layout, two 720K 3‘^-inch 
floppy disk drives, a serial port, and an 
enhanced display adapter . 


it will replace in Toshiba’s 
product line. 

Not to be outdone. Ze- 
nith Data Systems (whose 
$2,399 Z- 1 70 PC won the 
Internal Revenue Service 
contract last winter) intro- 
duced theZ-181 Portable 
PC . For the same price as the 
Z-170, which continues in 
Zenith’s line, the Z-181 
weighs 1 1.8 pounds, fea- 
tures twq 3'/2-inch floppy 
disk drives, 640K bytes of 
RAM, a backlit electrolumi- 
nescent LCD screen with the 
same aspect ratio as the IBM 
PC, and a rechargeable bat- 
tery that Zenith claims is 
go^ for up to 5 hours. The 
Z-i81 also features a full 
complement of output ports, 
including serial, parallel, 
RGB, and composite video, 
and a 5 '/4-inch floppy disk 
drive interface. 

List Price: Tl 100 Plus with 
2S6K RAM . $ 1 .995; with 640K 
RAM, $2,399. Toshiba Ameri- 
ca Inc., Infonnation Systems 
[MV..244I Michelle E)r..Tus- 
^ tin. CA 92680; (7 1 4) 730-5000. 

CIRCLE 430 ON READER SERVICE CATO 

List Price: Z-181 Portable PC, 
$2,399. Zenith Data Systems 
Inc., KXX) Milwaukee Ave., 
Glenview. IL 60025: 
(312)391-8949. 

CIRCLE 431 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




HIRST LOOKS 


Tseng, PC’s Limited EGAs 
Offer Features, Low Price 



BY JOE DESPOSITO 


Two recent EGA display boards 
are competing with IBM — the 
one from Tseng Laboratories on 
features and price, and the oth- 
er. from PC's Limited, on price 
alone. The Tseng board, called 
EVA. adds hardware zoom. 
132-column mode, and a paral- 
lel ptjrt for $525. The PC's Lim- 
ited board, called EGAds!. of- 
fers IBM EGA emulation at a 
rtKk-botlom $269. 

The two EGA boards were 
received Uh) late for review in 
••Achieving the Standard: 1 2 


EGA Boards” on page 140. Be- 
cause of time constraints, these 
Hands On first looks could not 
include the usual full range of 
PC Magazine Labs compatibil- 
ity and performance tests. 

Both boards offer the stan- 
dard array of EGA features such 
as displaying a 64-color palette 
and supporting smooth scrolling 
and panning, split screens, and 
redefinable fonts. Both include 
256K bytes of memory (an op- 
tion for IBM) and use custom 
VLSI chips. 

Tseng 132-Colunin Mode 

On the Tseng EVA with 
hardware zoom in operation. 


the zoomed area can be sized 
and Ueated under software con- 
trol in either text or graphics 
modes. Zooming makes an area 
look as if a magnifying glass 
were being moved around the 
screen. The zewmed area can 
also be displayed in scaled 
sizes. 

Four different screen dimen- 
sions can be produced with the 
Tseng board: 80 by 25. 132 by 
25. 132 by 28, and 132 by 44. A 
utility disk included in the pack- 
age has display drivers for 
/-2-.?, Release 2. or Symphony, 
Version 1.1. 

An optional $50 CMII mod- 
ule offers compatibility with 


IBM New Iteleases: 
InfoWindow, S]fs/38 


BY CRAIG L. STARK 

NEW YORK— Though Joan 
Rivers was ubscni. “Can we 
talk?" was the theme when 
IBM recently introduced more 
than 100 new products. Both the 
all new. seven-model Sys- 
tem/38 and the revamped four- 
mixlel Sysiem/36mini lines will 
be able to communicate directly 
with each other — without main- 
frame mediation — through a 
system called Advanced Peer- 
to-Peer Networking (APPN). 
Furthermore, a new Server-Re- 
quester Programming Interface 
(SRPI) has been developed to 
permit PC-class micros to share 
data with 370s. using virtual 
files to convert data on an as- 
needed basis between the differ- 
ent micro/mainframe formats. 
New adapter cards and .software 
will also increase the connectiv- 
ity range of the RT PC work.sla- 
tlons introduced last January. 

Touch-screen Interaction 

Among IBM's other new 
communications products was 
the $4,195 InfoWindow dis- 


play. which connects to an 
EGA-equipped PC-XT or AT. 
The InfoWindow display allows 
touch-screen interaction with 
graphics materials generated in- 
ternally or stored on a conven- 
tional. 54.(X)0-frame laserdisk. 
Scheduled for fourth-quarter 
availability, the InfoWindow 
demo material at the pre.ss brief- 
ing was limited to 200- rather 


With lilt’ IBM hifoWiiulow system you select 
ill)! the approprUiie Im.x on the screen . 


than 350-linc resolution but ad- 
equately .showed the training, 
sales, and educational potential 
of the unit. 

Piezoelectric Crystals 
InfoWindow’s display- 
screen technology involves u.s- 
ing piezoelectric crystal ele- 
ments located in the screen's 
four comers rather than a wire 
mesh imbedded in the screen. 
The voltages generated by the 
stress produced by touching the 
screen are analyzed within the 
display to provide kx;alization 
re.solution of '/i inch. ■ 


an option or answer a ifueslion hy touch- 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
46 


software written for the IBM co- 
lor/graphics and monochrome 
adapters and with the Hercules 
Graphics Card. Without this 
board, EVA Is only as compati- 
ble as the IBM EGA is with the 
IBM color/graphics and mono- 
chrome adapters. 

As mentioned, both the 
Tseng and PC's Limited boards 
use custom VLSI chips. The 
Tseng chips are manufactured 
by Tseng; the PC's Limited 
chips arc by Chips and Technol- 
ogies. Each company includes 
its own BIOS on its board. 

There’s not much to say 
about the PC's Limited board 
other than that it acceptably em- 
ulates the IBM EGA for a mere 
$269 and that the price includes 
a 256K-byte display memory on 
board. If you don't need special 
features, it's a good choice. ■ 


,'Tp FACT 

MW F I L E 


EVA 

Tseng Laboratories Inc. 

Newtown Industrial Cemmons 

205 Pheasant Run 

Newtown, PA 18940 

(215)968-0502 

List Price: $525; CMII option. 

$50. 

In ^lort: An EGA board with 
additional features sudi as 256K 
display memory standard, alter- 
nati ve screen dimensions ( 1 32 
by2S. 132 by 28. and 132 by 
44), hardware zoom, and a par- 
allel printer pc»t. Also includes 
software drivers for /O-i, Re- 
lease 2. and Symphony. Version 
1 . 1 , ftN* the alternative screens. 
A good choice for anyone re- 
quiring these added features. 

CIRCLE 444 ON READER SERVICE CAflO 


EGAds! 

PC's Limited 

161 1 Headway Circle, Bldg. 3 
Austin, TX 78754 
(512)339-6800 
List Price: $269. 
lo Short: An EGA board that 
includes 256K display memory 
standard at a rock-bottom price. 
If standard EGA features are the 
only requirement, this board Is 
an attractive buy. 

CIRCLE 448 ON READER SERVICE CARO 








7 Trap Falls Rd. 

Shelton, Connecticut 06484 


AT LAST. A 
FASTER PC 
AT A BETTER 
PRICE! 




■ RUNS ALL MAJOR 
SOFTWARE WRITTEN FOR 
THE IBM PC:“AT.’“ 

ANO COMPATIBLES. 

■ 8 MHZ SYSTEM UNIT 

[B MHZ SYSTEM UNIT 
ALSO AVAILABLE] 

■ 640 KB MOTHER BOARD 
INSTALLED AND TESTED. 

■ 1.2 MB AND 360 KB 
FLOPPY DISK DRIVE. 
[PRODUCED BY MAJOR INDUSTRY 
MANUFACTURERS] 

OVER 30% FASTER 
THAN THE IBM PC-AT^ 

S1945.00 


■ AT STYLE KEYBOARD. 

■ 200 WATT POWER SUPPLY. 

■ 8 EXPANSION SLOTS 

■ MS DOS 3i: USERS MANUAL, 
AND 2 YEAR LIMITED 
WARRANTY INCLUDED. 

■ TWO SERIALS AND ONE 
PARALLEL PORT 

■ CLOCK/CALENDAR WITH 
BATTERY BACKUP 

■ COMBINED FLOPPY/HARD 
DRIVE CONTROLLER CARD 

CALL TOLL FREE 
1-800-382-2242 
CONNECTICUT OROERS 
CALL 203-929-8522 
IN CANAOA 
1-800-843-0074 


SIMPLY THE BE 


Northeastern Software Turbo 286 is a trademark of Northeastern Software 
IBM PC, AT are trademarks of IBM Corporation 


CIRCLE 115 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


WITH PURCHASE RECEIVE AN ADDITIONAL 2% DISCOUNT ON ANYTHING ELSE WE SELL FOR A FULL YEAR. 



CALL TOLL FREE 1 


382-2242 



7 Trap Falls Rd. Sheton, Connecticut 06404 (SMBekw) 


WE WILL BEAT 


■ Top our unmotched »l«tion ond inventory of 
sottwore/hordwore for the IBM PC ond Commodore 
Amigo (os well os the Mot ond Apple). 

■ School and corporate purchase orders ore wel- 
comed. ULl 1-800-874-1108. 

■ Spedol/rush orders. If something you need is not 
listed, hard to h'nd, or needed in o hurry, CALL 
1-800-874-1108. 

■ Order Status. ULL (203) 375-3860. 

■ Ask for System Soles when ordering o complete 
system. 

■ FREQUENT PURCHASER PROGRAM. Any repeot 
customer will automatically receive $1 off any 
order he or she pieces with us. Please mention 
to your operator that you ore o repeot customer. 
We value your continuing business. Send in 
$1,000 svorth of invoices (representing previous 
purchases) and you will receive o coupon worth 
1% oH any future purchase. With $S,000 worth 
of invoices, receive o coupon worth 5% off ony 
future purdiose. 

I No odditionol charges for credit cord orders. 

I Convenient hours. 7 doys/week: 9AM-1I PM EST. 

I FREE AIR EXPRESS SHIPPING. Purchose $150 or 
more of software ond for no additional charge 
we will ship your products by air courier. Mention 
this to your operator os you ploce your order. 

I FURTHER DISCOUNTS BY MAIL. Grde the items 
in our od you wont, send the aid in with the 
coupon below and receive $ .50 oH eoch item! 

Cut out 0 competitor's od with o lower price ond 
vre trill give you $1 oH his price (subject to the 
conditions below). 


Sand rouport and 

DISCOUNT IT MAIL DiMRTMENT Mb 

Noethaonam SaFtnora. 68 Rydavp Lana. StroeFord. CT 06i97 


Addrau ^ 

CrFy StaA 

flionaNo at obowe addrau 
OiodL Forvn oF payntoM 

Vila NAcniavCard COO 
CaniFiad Oiadi AAenay Ovdar 


Compota* AAooal - 


Mwid lad noipaay Mb alaa 3 iMln » dwt M FtOar twd oAiit'i (Mi. 
ortiM ctek. m Mr mM StFpidii-SdrM (S3 N aWpiM) Skbpiaa-lMaM 
(ihM Ml tU 37$ JM} OD-Md n tmrn $3 N IMa. Naaai. Ctaoda. KL ML 
■d m $$ N mmmrn «dM-S)S N uNdMi od l $% d rf odm mi 
$M FMWwd md Vbt IMm ladaA cad aa Hd wNiiM Mi) Ciiilkn MddMi 
Nd 7 $A MmMi Nm takpo m dM|i ildiaai adia M Mam ktuaMtaia 
- ■UMbai Cif»3 37$ 3Mlla AMinikdDrtiatunai^padtfairarMa 
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pal d adur vaadan ar pkai dw da aai ladad MiImi did# 0 | <Ni. oadH cad daiaaL ai 
aaaAanMp la» fla SI all alia aa^ appiat la daai oIim MardMaMa'i pda a M 
ahaNr Ida laM. FM Ml— '•Mia oMk da awaaia m day. 


SPECIALS 

DAC 

37.00 

ARCHIVE 

Easy PoyioR . 

6IM16 Con Bockup (Inmnoi) . 

69S 00 Eosy Accountng 

750 00 EVERGREEN NETWARE 

S3.00 

AST 

One-Wnte Phis 

139 SO 

So Pock Plus 3B4K WSdekHk 

S» PACK PUMIUM SI2K 
amui POINT 

23S.OO GREAT PLAINS 

Business Programs 
OfENSYmMS 

4SOOO 

j8«rt 

17.50 Accountinq SoEtwoie 

CALI 

PEJkCHTIEE 


fUTVti {Al Configuiotbns] 

CALI B«k to B^ 

187.00 

NEC 

PeochtiM GLAPMR 

735 00 

AblhsyK 

TRUE BASIC 

520.00 SOtCIM 

Eosy Pks System 

99 00 ARAPfGl 

77 00 

True Bosk W 3-0 GrapliKS 

7SIOO 

SEAGATE 

SlAn OF THE ART 


70 Meg 1/2 HT XT INI 

470 00 ARMPiCL/IKV 

319 00 

BACK-UP / 

UNinO SOFTWARE 

In House Accountant 

100 00 


COPY SOFTWARE 

aUTIAl KIHT 

Copy II K 17 SO 

' " PC Opfion fioofd . . 71.50 




(orto Copy (7 hQ ) 

OUAI0 

tiFUi GCNrutiD* sontnut 

Fo^k 


TUNSEC 

Iiansec Modub A, B. ( or D 

30 00 

CHIPS 


INTEL 

Intel 8087 Moth Co-Picctssor 

L06.00 

M 8087-7 Moth Co-Pikissoi 

147.00 

Ifltd B0287 Nbth Co-Pwessoi 

MAJOR IRANO CNIfS 

175 00 

Sit oE 64k ISONS 

9.50 

Sat oE 756k ISONS 

78.50 

DESKTOP / 


UTILITY SOFTWARE 

ALPHA 

EbcftK Desk PC 

175 00 

KoMrks 

NURBAKI 

46 00 

1 DIR 

45 50 

BORLAND 

Siddbck 

77 50 

Sbdluk Non-Piotacted 

42.50 

Supertft 

34.00 

TrnMing Sidekck 
aNTIAL POINT 

39.50 

PCIeoEs 

0I6I1AL AESEAICH 

17 50 

Gen Colectien 

106 00 

Gem GnpJi 

137.00 

Got Wordchon 

87 00 

Got Desktop 

76 50 

Got Dm d/Deskiop. 
ELECTRONIC ARTS 

64.00 

Get Orgmed' 

EXECUTIVE SYSTEMS 

63.00 

X IlDC 

77 00 

GOLDEN low 

V FeoMe Deluxe . 

ULl 

MKIOSOn 

Wbdaars 

56 75 

PETER NOEETDN 

Norln Utities 3.1 

OUARTERDCCR SOFTWARE 

47 00 

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raSOFT 

54 00 

tor 

SOFTUKEC 

68.00 

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STAMIIDGE TECHNOLOGY 

CALI 

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5550 

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IPI 

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395 00 

Gmal Acc.WkP or brol 

276.00 

Job Cottm 
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375.00 

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(MAN6LAIS 

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59.00 


DATABASE SOFTWARE 

ALMA SOFTWIE 
Dotobost Monopai II 
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763.00 
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77.00 
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75.00 


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OuH Hi Plus 
^sknr •> Raym 
INFOCON 
Cwiwstona 

INHOlinVE SOFTNUU 
Snort SoPtMK Srstam . 

Smart Spcftng Checker 

micioInu use systems 

on 11/7 

. Upprodf Kd 

tunOHlM 

tlouf 2.0 

ExtinM Rapoit INma 
RBoseSOOO 
NANTUCKET 

r^iusc SYSTEMS 
Puaarbose 

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PfS. File 
PfS 

STDNEWUE 
Adwnced OS Muster 26S.0 

TIMEWNUS 

Dora Bose Munagn II . 76.5 

GRAPHia PACKAGES 

APniEO 50FTMIIE TECHNOUCY 
VtrscHi^ Kl 49.5 

US 

Onriwod Eiptess 99.5 

IRIGMTIIU ROIEITS 


7S0O 

66.00 


Graphic’ 

lUOEl 


lERIUND 
hm Shoo 
Greplws UbioiYi I 
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79.00 

3S.I)0 


195.00 

185.00 

130.00 


Enacin 
6(1 

GtoptwritMi Conbo Pack . 
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Chort 


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700.00 

155.00 

277.00 

187.00 

197 50 

165.00 


PCSOFTWRE 
Eacutna Picture Shoa 
SOFTCUn 


Foncy Fonts 
SOmTY ■ 


SeiFX 

SOFTWIE fUlLISHING 
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Oip Art Vol 1 
CkpArtVol? 

TiiUKEI 
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Ina Opiwi 
UNISON WORIO INC. 

Pratt Mosid . 71 

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GRAPHICS TABLETS 
AND MICE 

IMSI 

OR Hob II 
PC PoNHba-sh Pks 


33 50 
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. 31.50 
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7100 

105 00 
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PROGRAMMING 

LANGUAGES 

ADDISON WtSLCY 
true Bosk 

NILAND 

Turbo Pascal ^8087 
Turbo PdscoI WBCD 
l«tM Pnco! i^NS7. BCD 
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lutbo GcmMcaks 
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lubo Eddca loolboi 
lurte iutor 
luibo New Pock 
lutbo Probg . . . 

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logitech Mouse aW Hab II 
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8000 

37.00 
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24.50 
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PC Jr Mouse 1 ^ Poait 
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PC Abuse + Pom -f 137 00 
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Three Button Jcvstxk 
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l«& Mouse «/0R Kab 
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Sumrno Skaiech 12 t 12 

HOME FINANCE 
PACKAGES 

lAnERIES INOUOEO 
Ebcnonk Checkbook 
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The InstniCior II 
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2000 

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45.00 


32 00 
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2200 

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24 00 
41 00 

14.00 

22.00 


14.00 

12.00 
2100 
21.00 
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1700 
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19 00 
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21.00 


felony 

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Bruce Im 

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35 


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Cd 

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370 

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1025.00 
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235.00 
Cell 


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Above Boon) PC i^44K Cd 

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video; 

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IBM 


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Cd 

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VIDEO CONTROLLER 
CARDS 


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Said Port Module A . 42 00 

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dock ■/44Ilom Module 8 120 00 

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COMMUNICATION 

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awnisiiK 

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aRCLE 126 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




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WITH PURCHASE RECEIVE AN ADDITIONAL 2 % DISCOUNT ON ANYTHING ELSE WE SELL FOR A FULL YEAR 

CIRCLE 135 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



FIRST I. () <) K S 


New Hercules Card Bridges 
World of Text, Graphics 


II Tke Nerciiet Cr<r>>ic C«r4 Flat - Fe<t«ri*f ImiFo»i” no4* 

Fa»fy>t* *>as of tf# Hercyl« 'VacF'its Card all:*fS »jUjcW 
5**s T fcTiis to b* oa*-ir>«d. lit* s«rif ar-d sar-S'sarif fxts. 

r*i f*" milk aorMl cbaractcrt - ii tcil aoatf 

RwFoflt" iti of courie. tioal for nuUi-li&^oal teit procetcia). Bere la a 
Crrtliic character aet. aai a <>re«lc character aet : 

«siroadnu»woaFa«xit<n AiotorNiirmoNPirrxgrtz 

WFl/I uA: fCamFIE i3 IWMTlEilS ilXit hIS fi 

rWftCinS 9 ^ i(XH 

twflal fMtt em be eretted for titlei or eflt4ttsif fai^t* it fut mi aery 
How it aais for froeeatii*t aoftware •• iafloMat 

■' •j :iri • create * those f sjatols b thiat ^ •• 'eallv ■» r-eed. 

lai#Ml* a«kiMa Ihe k^aaO mi taka-eF-oae aF hot *#41 aiU Me 
•F ye a a>iaa MFe 

•i>t a>« tfi* 'j-yv ifJi'-.t. 


r/ir J299 Hercules Graf^ics Card can display up lo 12 256-character fonts (above) 
and limited graphics while maintaining the speed of a text-only display. 


tinue to make the “green 


‘Here Plus’ offers 
speed advantage 
over bit-mapped 
graphics cards. 


BY CHARLES PETZOLD 
Hercules Computer Technol- 
ogy. the only company besides 
IBM that has succeeded in es- 
tablishing a video standard for 
the PC, refused to get on the 
EGA color bandwagon. In- 
stead. Hercules has announced 
the Graphics Card Plus, its first 
new product in 2 years and a sig- 
nificant advance over the Her- 
cules Graphics Card. 

The $299 Graphics Card Plus 
is a functional superset of the 
well-known Hercules Graphics 
Card for the monochrome dis- 
play. Like the earlier Hercules 
board, the “Here Plus'’ sup- 
ports the normal IBM 80 by 25 
monochrome character mode 
and the Hercules standard 720 
by 348 bit-mapped graphics 
mode. In addition, the Here 
Plus adds a third mode that is 
not quite graphics and not quite 
character but combines the best 
features of both. 

Hercules is betting that the 
lower price, better resolution, 
and established user-base of 
monochrome displays will con- 


screen” the corporate favorite. 
Hercules is also expecting the 
speed degradation inherent in 
today's bit-mapped graphics 
displays to be ultimately unsat- 
isfactory for users. When the 
smoke clears over the battle be- 
tween text modes (speed) and 
graphics modes (versatility). 
Hercules hopes the winner will 
be: RamFoni. 

RamFont Video Mode 
RamFont is Hercules’s term 
for the new video mode on the 
Graphics Card Plus that allows 
programs to display different 
fonts and limited graphics while 
still maintaining the speed of a 
character display. Uplo 12 256- 
character fonts may be loaded 
into the upper 48K-byte region 


of R.AM on the Graphics Card 
Plus board. Instead of the nor- 
mal 8-bit ASCII code and 8-bit 
attribute code, character data 
uses a 1 2-bil character code and 
a 4-bit attribute code. The ex- 
panded character code allows 
the display of 3.072 (12 fonts 
limes 256) different characters 
on the screen. The attribute 
ccxJe includes support for hard- 
ware blinking, high intensity, 
strike-out. and boldface. 

The 12 separate fonts give 
the Graphics Card Plus a big ad- 
vantage over the text modes of 
IBM's Enhanced Graphics 
Adapter (EGA). The EGA can 
store four 256-characler fonts in 
text mode and can display only 
two at any time. The fonts may 
be 4 to 16 scan lines high on the 
Here Plus card and 1 to 32 scan 
lines high on the EGA. On both 
cards, the fonts are either 8 or 9 
dots wide. The 9-dot-wide font 
is restricted to 8 dots of data 
with (he 9ih dot displayed as 
background (except for the line 
and bhKk characters that need 
to connect on the horizontal ). 

No Proportional Font 

The Here Plus and the EGA 
are both incapable of displaying 
proportional fonts in text modes 
and cannot use different line 
heights on the same screen. 
However, the larger memory 
area allocated for font storage in 


Hercules Card Battles the Clones 


The new Hercules Graphics 
Card Plus and its predeces- 
sor. the Hercules Graphics 
Card, are to carry the same 
$299 list price. The Hercules 
Graphics Card was previ- 
ously $499. 

Hercules says the new 
card will initially be sold 
close lo list price, while the 
original card w ill continue to 
be discounted. Add in a S50 


company rebate through the 
summer and the original will 
cost as little as $140. 

Hercules president Kevin 
Jenkins denies that the pric- 
ing aims at clone makers that 
sell Hercules kntKkoffs for 
as low as SKK). but he says. 
“If the difference is only 
$30 or $40. fewer people 
will buy clones,” 

— Charlea Bermant 


ril|5 F A C T 
FILE 


G raph ics Ca rd PI us ( ( • B 1 1 2 1 
Hercules Computer 
fechnologs 
255(lNinihSt..#210 
Berkeley. CA 947 10 
(4l.5)54()-6(KK) 

Lbt Price: $299 
Requires: IBM MomK'hrome 
Display or compatible. 

In .Short: An interesting 
approach in the Graphics Card 
Plus bridges the gap between 
text and monochrome graphics 
miHles while providing lull 
compatibility w ith the Hercules 
Graphics Card. 

CinCLE 424 ON READER SERVICE CARO 


the Here Plus card lets the board 
display large-sized letters by 
piecing together font fragments 
from several different font ta- 
bles. Large letters and small let- 
ters can be mixed on the same 
screen, something normally 
possible only with a bit-mapped 
graphics display. 

RamFont is ideal for a pro- 
gram such as Microsoft Word, 
which can display different 
fonts but not different character 
sizes. Word usually requires a 
graphics display for this on- 
screen formatting. The Here 
Plus board includes a driver for 
Word, Version 3.0. that sup- 
ports all the Word character for- 
matting while still maintaining 
the speed of the character mode. 
(In theory, a 14-scan-line high 
character can be .scrolled seven 
times faster In character mode 
than in graphics mode, but the 
difference in Word 3.0 is not 
nearly this great.) 

The Here Plus card also 
comes with drivers for 1-2-3, 
Release 2. and Symphony. Ver- 
sion 1 . 1 . for a 90 by 38 spread- 
sheet display. Although a 90 by 
38 Hercules driver is already in- 
cluded with these packages, the 
older one uses the 720 by 348 
graphics mode. The Here Plus 
card does it in character mode 
and thus provides significantly 
faster scrolling. 

By treating the alternate font 
memory as if it were bit-mapped 

(continued on next page) 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
51 




t 1 K S 1 1 

1. O () K S 



Hercules 

{continued from precedinji page) 

graphics memory, software can 
also combine text and graphics- 
like images on the same screen. 
Additional /-2-i Symphony 
drivers included with the Here 
Plus board provide a startling 
example of this by displaying a 
graph on a comer of the spread- 
sheet. The worksheet Is in char- 
acter mode so it scrolls and up- 
dates quickly, but the graph is 
plainly bit-mapped. 

The Here Plus card comes 
with the same software as the 
Hercules Graphics Card and 
adds a font editor, font loader, 
and .several sample fonts. Full 
technical information on using 
RaniFonl comes with the board. 
A sample chess program (with 
assembly language source code) 
shows how to use RamFonl to 
create graphics icons and move 
them around as if they were 
character data. Unlike the EGA. 
the Here Plus card does not in- 
clude a BIOS extension for sup- 
port of more than 25 character 
lines on the screen. 

How Much of a Future? 

It will be interesting to see if 
software support develops for 
the RamFont mode of the Her- 
cules Graphics Card Plus. Mi- 
crosoft Wori/ adapts very well lo 
this mode, but other programs 
may not be as well suited. Mi- 
crosoft Windows, for instance, 
relies on bit-mapped graphics 
and proportional fonts to such 
an extent that a faster Windows 
driver using RamFont would be 
virtually impossible. (Of 
course, Windows can still run on 
the old 720 by 348 graphics 
mode supported by the Here 
Plus card). Moreover, the im- 
minent availability of video 
adapters based on dedicated 
graphics chips is destined to 
eliminate many of the speed 
problems currently experienced 
with bit-mapped graphics dis- 
plays. 

While the Hercules Graphics 
Card Plus RamFont mode is 
surely an unusual and interest- 
ing solution lo the speed prob- 
lem of bit-mapped graphics, 
even at S299 it may be a little 
too late and a little loo offbeat lo 
have a significant impact on the 
video adapter market. 


Alwve Board PS/At 
E xt&ids Intel Ime 


H ANDS ON 


BY CHARLES PETZOLD 

The Above Board PS/AT 
rounds out Intel's strong line of 
extended and expanded memo- 
ry products for the PC and AT. 
Just as the Above Board/PS is a 
multifunction version of the 
Above Board/PC. the Above 
Board PS/AT is similar lo the 
Above Board/ AT and adds par- 
allel and serial ports. 

The Above Board PS/ AT can 
hold up lo 1.5 megabytes of 
memory (the Above Board/AT 
holds 2 megabytes). The paral- 
lel port can be set for either 
LPT I or LPT2 (which become 
LPT2 or LPT3 if a monochrome 
card is also in the system), and 
the serial port is either COM I or 
COM2. A $995 piggyback 
board can add another 2 mega- 
bytes to the configuration; it’s 
the same board that's available 


for the Above Board/AT. 

Two Kinds of RAM 

DIP switches on the board 
specify the starting and ending 
addresses of AT-type extended 
memory in 512K-byte incre- 
ments up lo 8 megabytes. You 
may also use I28K of the 
board's memory lo backfill con- 
ventional memory from 5 1 2K to 
640K. Anything left over can be 
used for Loius/Inlel/Microsoft 
expanded memory. 

For users who want more and 
more memory, the Above 
Board PS/AT can coexist with 
one or more Above Board/ ATs. 
Since the Expanded Memory 
Manager driver program can ac- 
cess expanded memory from 
four different Above Board/AT 
or PS/ AT cards, you can easily 
reach the 8-megabyte maximum 
allowed under the Lotu.s/Intcl- 
/Micro.soft expanded memory 
specification. 


For multifunction card users who 
want more and more memory, the Above 
Board PS/AT can coexist with one or 
more of Intel’s Above Board/AT 
expanded memory cards. 




FACT 

FILE 


.\tM)vc Hoard l*S .M 
IniL*l (*i>rp. 

.S2(K) Nl'. FJum Young Pkwy . 

Hillsboro. OR 97124 

(.SO.t)()St-KOKO 

List Price: With I2SK RAM. 

I2K. S69.S; 1 .5 Mbytes. 
$1,095; With 2 Mbytes RAM ol 
piggyback RAM. $995. 
Requires: IBM l*C A T or com- 
patible 

In .Short: Well-built I2XK to 
3.5-.Mby te memory bttard Im 
the K' AT. snnilar lo the Above 
Hoard/AT. with parallel and se- 
rial ports added Meimvry can 
be apportioned among conven- 
tional. expanded. and extended 
RAM First-rate installation 
guide. 

' 425 •NRtAOrfiSERVlia 


Shortcuts for Experts 

The short and concise 
“Hacker's Guide” that Intel be- 
gan including with its Above 
Boards following some early 
negative reaction to its setup 
program has been renamed 
“Shortcuts to Installing the 
Above Board PS/AT for DOS 
Expen.s.” By “DOS Experts.” 
Intel means people who are fa- 
miliar with the concepts of con- 
ventional. extended, and ex- 
panded memory, know how to 
set DIP switches, and can edit 
AUTOEXEC.BAT and CON- 
FIG.SYS files. For everyone 
else, there’s an extensive man- 
ual and configuration program 
to help out with installation. 
The software includes a memo- 
ry check/diagnostics utility, 
plus RAMdisk and print buffer 
programs that use either con- 
ventional or expanded memory. 

By combining backfilled 
conventional memory, extend- 
ed memory, expanded memory, 
and parallel and serial ports on 
one card, the Above Board 
PS/ AT is an excellent first board 
for the new PC AT owner. Vet- 
eran PC AT owners who have 
already run out of expansion 
slots can also benefit by replac- 
ing some of their older bt>ards 
with the Above Board 
PS/AT. [la 





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Purchase Order 

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Accounts Payable 

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Payroll /Labor 

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CIRCLE 470 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




I- 1 K S T I. () <> K S 


I PC UPDATE ■ CHRISTOPHER JOHNSTON 


IBM Corp. released PC-DOS 3.21 in the form of a patch to DOS 
3.2. Some users get an error when cursor keys on the new IBM key- 
board (with 12 function keys) won’t respond in BASICA edit mode. 
The patch Fix is available free from dealers where users purchased 
IX)S3.2. 

***** 

Javelin Software Corp. of Cambridge. Mass., is moving toward 
the ’’selective elimination" of copy protection through corporate 
software licensing. Javelin will deliver any combination of locked 
and unlocked Javelin units and leave the decision of who will use 
those copies to corporate managers. There are four license quantity 
levels: 50, 100, 250, and 500. Fifty copies of Javelin are $20.0(X), 
or $400 each. Single copies of the $695 package remain copy pro- 
tected. 

***** 

Quadram Corp. of Norcross, Ga., and Digital Research of Mon- 
terey. Calif., have agreed to bundle DRI's Concurrent PC DOS 
Expanded Memory (XM) operating system with Quadram’s 
EMS+ expanded memory boards. The XM environment runs up to 
four unmodified programs in 8 megabytes of memory concurrently. 
So, for instance, 1-2-3, dBASE ill Plus, WordStar, and Crosst^k 
XVI can co-reside with no speed or performance degeneration. The 
DRI operating environment alone retails for $395 . 

***** 

Homebase, the SideKick-Wkt memory-resident utility, has been 
trimmed from 180K to 80K bytes in Version 3.0, following its ac- 
quisition by Brown Bag Software from Amber Systems. Version 
3.0 costs $69.95, plus $5 shipping, or $49.95 for SideKick users 
who trade in their disks. Upgr^es are $29.95 for registered users of 
Version 2.0. Brown Bag also dropped copy protection on the new 
release (Version 3.0) of the Brown Bag Word Processor with mail- 
merge, bundled in the $89 Outline! (its memory-resident outline 
processor), and raised the price from $89.95 to $129.95. 

***** 

Toshiba of America is selling expansion board upgrade kits for 
its 24-pin P34], P321, and older P351 dot matrix printers, enabling 
them to emulate the IBM Graphics Printer and Qume Sprint 1 1 
daisy wheel printer. Upgraded printers will execute full graphic 
screen dumps from PCs or compatibles and download disk-based 
type fonts. The kits are: P351 Dual Emulation (DE) kit ($99). the 
P341 DEand Down Line Loading (DLL) kit ($199), the P32I DLL 
kit ($99). and the P321 IBM Graphics Printer emulation kit ($49). 
Contact the Information Systems Division of Toshiba America, 
2441 Michelle Dr., Tustin.CA 92680. 

***** 

Epson America is dropping prices on hard disk versions of its Eq- 
uity line. The Equity 1 rc compatible dropped 14 percent, from 
$2,195 to $1,895, for the system unit without a monitor or video 
card; the Equity II XT compatible dropped 14 percent, from $2,895 
to $2,495; and the Equity III AT compatible dropped 7 percent, 
from $4,195 to $3,895. In addition. Epson is promoting its list Eq- 
uity I PC, including the $995 floppy disk version, by including a 
free LX-80 printer ($329 list). 

***** 

Efficiency claims for the Dvorak keyboard may be overstated. 
At best, typists are 3 to 10 percent faster, according to "The Ergo- 
nomics of Office Keyboards’ ’ in the Office Systems Ergonomics Re- 
port, a bimonthly publication on human factors engineering. The is- 
sue. devoted entirely to keyboard ergonomics, labels as unfounded 
claims by Dvorak keyboard proponents that they can out-type 
QWERTY users by 15 to 50 percent. The issue costs $30 and is 
available from the Koffler Group, 3029 Wilshire Blvd., #200, San- 
ta Monica, CA 90403; (213) 453-1844. 


t 1 






Keyironic 5 150 D\-orak keyboard 


Visually impaired PC users will find a helping hand in Add-Ons, 
the Ultimate Guide to Peripherals for the Blind Computer User. 
The publication is available in type, braille, and on cassette from the 
National Braille Press. 88 Stephen St., Boston. MA 021 15; (617) 
266-6160. 

***** 

Lotus Develc^ment Corp. of Cambridge, Mass., released S^- 
nal. Version 1 . 1 , an enhanced version of its $595 stock quotation 
service. Signal added listings for the Kansas City Board of Trade 
and the New York Futures Exchange. Also added is a News Alert 
feature that flags company listings as relevant news becomes avail- 
able. 

Lotus also acquired graphics developer Graphic Communica- 
tions of Waltham, Mass., making GCI the fifth corporation in the 
Lotus portfolio. GCI markets two graf^ics programs. Freelance 
and Graphwriter. 

***** 

In brief: Grid Systems Corp. reduced the price of its Gridcase 
laptop PC by 28 percent, from $4,350 to $3,125. The Gridcase 2 
dropped 18 percent, from $3,150 to $2.595. ..Bit Software's Bit- 
Corn communications program is now available for $65. Previously 
it was distributed through modem bundling. . .Direc-Tree Plus from 
Micro-Z Co. is no longer copy protected and has been rewritten in 
assembly language. Price is $49.95, and upgrades are $20, plus $5 
shipping and handling. . .Western Union now has 70 new databases 
on its Infomaster service (formerly called InFact)...Fontasy, Ver- 
sion 2, from Prosoft includes 60 pieces of small clip art and has bet- 
ter resolution (240 by 216) than the old version; upgrades are 
$25 . . .Oracle Corp. plans to ship Version 5.0 of its Oracle relational 
database management system for the PC in late summer. No price 
yet, but Oracle says it will have a user-friendly front end. . .Generic 
Software's Generic CADD, Version 2.0, has 100 new features, in- 
cluding macros, plot spooling, and rotation and rescale functions. 
Upgrades are $25 . . . Ven-Tel has extended its modem warranty to 5 
years on modems purchased after May 1 . Earlier warranties were 2 
years for internal and 1 year for external modems... Springboard 
Software upgraded The Newsroom to The Newsroom Pro. En- 
hancements include no copy protection and 2,000 pieces of clip art, 
which can be resized and flipped around. Upgrades cost $60. . .Busi- 
ness Tools released TAS-Plus, a $69 version of its TAS relational 
database manager. The older version ($199) is still in circulatitm- 
. . .Lifetree Software halted direct sales of its Volkswriter word pro- 
cessor; it's still available through retail channels. ..AST releas^ a 
new version of its RAMpage AT memory board compatible with 
8-MHz PC ATs. AST will replace existing RAMpage AT boards 
free for owners who have compatibility problems... IBM released 
an updated version of its desktop Serie^i minicomputer using an 
8'MHz PC AT with a 3C)-megabyte hard disk. The unit runs both 
Series/I and PC-IX)S software. ■ 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGU.ST 1986 
54 





P rcscntatioas! Ncv^-skitcrs' I1\vrs! 
Signs! (Kcrhcad l■(^jls! In\ica- 
tions! Menus! Logos! An- 
nounccmenis! Banners! Layouts! 

'X lien you nml a gtxKlIiKiking \ isual 
t|ujckly you need I’ON’IAS^' ^ su(X.‘rii 
tNpefaces and simple tlnnving m one 
easy to use paekage. 

FONTASY gives you a “wliai-you see-ls* 
what-you-get” picture. :ls you nix* and draw 
on die graphics screen ofytnir IBM l*C. You 
can create a jrage at a lime, sex* a mini pic 
lure of that page, prim it. and save it on disk. 
l*age si/e is ilniilexi only by memory, not ly 
screen si/e 

Features 

Prt^xmional space, jasiify. kern, bold 
face, rearrange, magnib-, black white rever 
sal. rotate, mirror image, lines, rectangles, 
ov-al.s. draw, fill in. undo (and un undo), on 
line help. 200 page Ixxik. and c'a.sy ctxiirol 
from keyb(»ard or mouse. Corporate 
liceruses available. 

Fonts, fonts, and more fonts! We have 
over 275 npeSices in <»ur growing librarv’. 
and will be happy to send vtni fax* pritii 
samples on rctiuesi. 

VClien you deal directly with the manufac 
turer (that's us), you pay rexk bixtom dis 
tribulor prices. If you order FONTASY now. 
we will give you 28 fonts (a $50 vtilue) at no 
extra charge. 'X'ith so many features at such a 
low price. FONTASY Ixdongs in your .yift 
ware librarv* even if you alrctdv' have a 
■■font" program. 


See What You Can Do 
With 


Fonia.sy printed all of thc*se. 



Includes 28 Fonts 
and FREE Clip Art 


Equipment Needed 

IB.M IX:. XT. AT. or true conipaiiblc (('ompuq. 
etc.) with IB.M or Hercules jtraphic's adapter and 
graphics numiior. 2V>K mcin<ir>' ncc-dcd for partial 
pages, ^•^H•6^0K recommended for full pages. 
IX>t- matrix printer MtHise optional. MSIX>S 
2.00 or abo\-c. 

FDNTASy -sui^trts; IBM graphics printer. 
Pntprinter: Epson EX. JX. L\. MX. RX. and 
l.Q IMX); C. Hoh 8S10. ISSO. IS70. Pn^ 
writer Jr H P lascrjet. Thinkjet; Mieroline 92. 
9.<: (iemini lOX. 15X; Radit) Shack D.MP lOS- 
-l.VO. 2100; foshiba .^Sl. !340-I3S!; Star; and 
^ most Epson-compaiibles 

Money-Back 

Guarantee 

Fonta.sy is not copy pnHected and has a 
50 day money back guarantee. So. take 
aclv'tiiiagc of our brc*akthrough price and 
order nowTOa FUKH: 


1 - 800 - 824-7888 , operator 577 (orders onlyi 


For further information and s;inie day shilling, call: (818 )7ri5-t H l 


® 


"i lH Ikrllairc Ave.. Box 5(»0 
No. HoIIvwcxkI. (A yK>05 t>5<>0 


FONTASY $69.95 

Tax 

Shipping 

Total 


Company 

TcIc-phonc _ 


Fxp. Date 


Citv. Stale. /IP 

Visa MC 

Computer - .Memory Printer 

Terms M Vtu. chccle< IHrase add i V Oi) shippinn and handling in t > 
(anada. 52000 «ncrsc» S200 fur ( t) [) and salcMax in (aiif 


CIRCLE 300 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


Add up to 96K 
above 640K to all 
programs, including 
PARADOX and 1-2-3. 


Parity-checked 2S6K 
with a one-year 
warranty 


Run custom software 
or the 3270 PC 
Control Program 
above 640K 



Run resident 
programs like 
Sidekick above 640K 


Short card works in 
the IBM PC. XT AT 
and compatibles. 


1bpoffaSI2KIBM 
ATs memory to 640K 
and add another 
128K beyond that 


Add expanded 
memory to programs 
supporting the 
Lotus/Intel/ 

Microsoft 
specif cation 3.2 


MAXTT “memory works above 640K 
for only $195. 


Break through the 640K barrier 

MAXrr increases your PC's avail- 
able memory beyond 640K. And it 
does it for only $195. 

MAXTT includes a 256K half-size 
memory card that works above 640IC 
MAXTT will 

■ Add up to 96K above 640K to all 
programs, 

■ Run memory resident programs 
above 640X 

■ Tbp off an IBM ATs memory from 
512K to 640X 

■ Expand 1-2-3 Release lA or 2.0 
worksheet memory by up to 256X 

■ Add expanded memory above 
640K to programs like Symphony 1.1, 

Big gain — no paia 

Extend the productive life of your 
IBM PC, XT AT or compatible. Build 
more complex spreadsheets and 
databases without upgrading your 
present software. 


Installation is a sn^. 

MAXrr works automatically. You don't 
have to learn a single new command 
If you have questions, our customer 
support people will answer them 
fast. MAIOT is backed by a one-year 
warranty and a 30-day money-back 
guarantee. 

Onder toU free 1-800-221-8439. 

MAXIT is just $195 plus $4 shipping 
and applicable state sales tax. Buy 
MAXIT today and solve your PC's 
memory crisis. Call toll free 1-800- 
221-8439 (In Ttexas 1-21+437-7411). 

We accept VISA, MC, AE and DC 

S'iM McGraw-Hill CCIG 
lYnili ^ftware 

8111 LBJ Freeway, Dallas, Tfexas 75251 
Dealer/corporate inquiries welcome. 


MAlCr. .'i.-kn.uK 4M-UI'. 

I" t. 1 ’iLi 

ARSA r<4tw..t*- 


fUCCMS IBM r t JLiMikiluxbu BuriM-s: I 2 3,in< 

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CIRCLE 261 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


I Sympnony 
I'HlHTMlk '4 










The Best Features: 

been talking about their Enhanced Graphic Adapters . . . but 
want talk ... you want product! STB's got it and STB is 
delivering EGA Pms'" . . . NOW!!! 

STB's EQkPWS"" is a universal video board that operates in 16 different 
text and graphics modes, and is compatible with the IBM Enhanced 
Graphics Adapter'*. STB^ EGA pum"* also provides 256K memory 
without need for the IBM Graphics Memory Expansion Card’* ... 
saving you money! 


YOU COMPARE THE FEATURES: 


STANDARD FEATURES 

EGA PLUS" 

IBM- 

Supports IBM PC/XT/AT'* and compatibles 

✓ 

✓ 

Supports 640 X 350 for IBMS Enhai>ced Color artd Monochrome 

Diaplavs and compatible monitors 

✓ 

✓ 

Supports full 16 colors in 640 x 350 on the IBM Enhanced Color 

Display’* and compatibles 

✓ 

✓ 

Supports full 16 colors in 640 x 200 and 320 x 200 for the IBM 

Color Display 

✓ 

✓ 

Parallel printer port 

✓ 


Soft scrollinq, panninQ and windowing 

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✓ 

Optiortal Ciock/Calendar 

✓ 


Supports a lipht pen interface 

✓ 

✓ 

Includes PC Accelerator'* . STB's occlusive utility program which 
provides up to 10 disk emulators. 3 pnnt spooleis and utilizes 
available system memory. PC/AT memory above one megabyte and 

EMS merrxxy |Lolus’*/lntel'* /Microsoft'*! through STB^ Memory 
Companion/PC "* board. 

✓ 


Which board sells for 40% less than the other comparable product? 

✓ 



The Best Company 

STB . . . bom to be “Simply The Best*! STB Systems. Inc. has dedicated itself since 1981 to designing 
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Proven by performance, STB has earned the reputation In the marketplace of consistently providing 
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STB carries this concept through from highly sophisticated board design ... to no-compromise 
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STB leaves nothing to chance to insure that we will remain at the leading edge of the marketplace 
producing innovative products of the highest quality, staying “Simply The Best"! It’s not easy, but itij 
worth it ... to you and to us! 


CIRCLE 517 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


EGA pu/s, Memory Companion'PC (raOemerKs ol STB Systems. 
ITK. IBM. IBM PCOa/AT”. IBM Enhanced Graphics Adapter. IBM 
Enhar)ced Color Display. IBM Graphics Memory Exparraton Card 
registered trademartis ol International Business Machines Corp PC 
Accelerator trademark ol RESICORP. Lotus trademark of Lotus 
Oevetopment Corp. Intel trademark of Intel Corp Microsoft 
trademark of Microeoft Corporation. 



601 N. Glenville, Suite 125 • Richardson. Ibcas 75081 • (214) 234-8750 


Fcff $295 you can draw 
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* Drafi^E 1. The first hh^ performance CAD software everyone can afford. 



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Low-cost, high perfonnance computer 
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Snap-mode options are continually 
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And it's all controlled by a versatile 
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If you or someone in your company 
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■ RKVIEVVS IN BRIEF ■ EDITED BY PALE M. STAEEORD 


The Twin: Slow 
Lotus for Less 


BY CHRISTOPHER BARR 

Another 1-2-3 clone, called The 
Twin, has found its way into the 
marketplace. A more appropri- 
ate name, however, might be 
“The Little Brother.” This 
non-copy-protecied program 
looks a lot like the big guy but 
doesn't quite measure up. 

If you use 1-2-3, you will 
feel comfortable working with 
The Twin. The menus are nearly 
identical, the worksheet is as 
large as that of />2-i. Release 2, 
the help screens are similar, and 
the spreadsheet looks the same. 
One small difference with The 
Twin Is that the worksheet is dis- 
played at the top of the monitor, 
with the control panel at the bot- 
tom, while 1-2-3 reverses the 
order. The Twin doesn’t show 
you the date, as does 1-2-3, Re- 
lease 2, but it does display avail- 
able memory in a status box on 
the screen. When you are in the 
“ready” mode. The Twin adds 
a nice touch: it displays the 
meanings of the function keys, 
obviating any need for those 
handy little function-key tem- 
plates you get with Lotus’s 
package and promptly lose the 
next day. If you have a color 
monitor, you can select differ- 
ent colors for the worksheet, in- 


cluding the foreground and 
background and the inverse 
foreground and background; 
there is no choice with 1-2-3. 

Better Graphics 

The Twin has it all over 1-2-3 
when it comes to graphics capa- 
bilities, offering both analysis 
and presentation-quality graphs 
and charts. Choose analysis 
when you want to quickly view 
data in simple graphs for analyt- 
ical purposes, pick the presenta- 
tion-quality mode when you 
want to impress your boss. 
1-2-3 offers five graph choices: 
line, bar. xy. stacked bar. or 
pie, with up to six data ranges. 
The Twin adds such options as a 
choice between horizontal and 
vertical bar charts and pie-bar 
charts to this repertoire. It does 
both in three dimensions, and 
you can use up to eight data 
ranges. The horizontal and ver- 
tical bars can be stacked, clus- 
tered, positive, or positive and 
negative. Options for presenta- 
tion-quality graphs include a 
choice of colors, font type, font 
size, and patterns. The screens 
from which you make the selec- 
tions are easy to use. 

That covers much of the 
good news. The bad news is that 
The Twin is s-l-o-w. Using the 



The Twin spreadsheet looks much like 1-2-3'f. with two exceptions: its command line 
is across the bottom of the screen, and it gives you a menu of function keys. 


PC Magazine Labs 1-2-3 bench- 
mark test, we clocked the 
amount of time it took to enter 
data and then execute five basic 
commands. The Twin took near- 
ly 16 minutes to complete the 
test on a floppy-based XT with 
640K bytes of RAM; 1-2-3 did 
it in 3 minutes and S seconds. 
The difference between the two 
was so great that, thinking 1 had 
a defective copy. 1 tried it with a 
different copy of The Twin. The 
results were identical. 

On the plus side, The Twin 
adds a few features that big 
brother might be jealous of. 
Added financial functions in- 
clude (d mirr. which calculates 

Icontinues) 



FACT 

FILE 


The Twin 

Mosaic Software Inc. 

1972 Massachusetts Ave. 
Cambridge. M A 02 1 40 
(617)491-24.34 
Li.st Price: $ 1 45 
Requires: .320K RAM, two 
disk drives. DOS 2.0 or later. 

In Short: The Twin is an inte- 
grated spreadsheet pn>grani 
similar to 1-2-3 that has better 
graphics but a slower operation- 
al speed. Not copy protected. 
CIRCLE 623 ON READER SERVICE CARO 


Softvme CaiWBelRuns 
Maty Programs at Once 


BY PAUL M. STAFFORD 

Cheap mass RAM and cheap 
mass disk storage have one draw- 
back: people want to use 
them — all the time. Whether 
they need to or not. Sofm’are 
Carousel lets such people 
quench their thirst for using 
RAM and can radically improve 
the way they work in the process. 

Software Carousel lets you 
simultaneously load as many 
programs as you can think of 
into as much RAM as you can 
cram into your machine, and 
you can switch easily between 


them. If you don’t have much 
RAM . it can trade programs and 
open files onto up to 6.4 mega- 
bytes of hard disk space. Is this 
multitasking? Actually, it’s 
much simpler. Software Carou- 
sel partitions memory into 
whatever-size chunks each pro- 
gram needs (in increments of 
16K bytes). You activate a 
chunk by hitting a user-pro- 
grammable “hot key” combi- 
nation; only the partition that is 
active uses the PC’s central pro- 
cessor. Programs stop dead 
when you switch to another par- 
(continues} 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
59 



R K \’ I K W S 


R R I K ( 



The Twin 

(continiud) 

a modified rate of return, and 
@rate, which will calculate the 
rate of return on an investment 
for n periods of time. Logical 
functions available are ^and, 
@Jor, and @not. The Twin has 
extra macro commands for 
moving around the spreadsheet. 
Be careful, though: The Twin 
can read 1-2-3 files, but 1-2-3 
will not recognize The Twin 
worksheets or macros unless 
you save the files with the 
Translate command. If you save 
your files normally, 1-2-3, Re- 
Iea.se 2, will give the error mes- 
sage “Worksheet file is out of 
date,” and Release I A will dis- 
may you with the information 
that what you have fed it is “not 
a valid worksheet file.” 

If you don’t work with large 
spreadsheets, chances are you 
won’t be put off by The Twin's 
sluggish performance. If you 
want more graphics than 1-2-3 
can offer, this package may be a 
good choice. For $145, I’d say, 
“Hello, little brother.” 58 


Software Carousel 

(coniinued) 

tition and resume where you left 
off when you return. On one 
hand, there's no background 
processing. On the other, pro- 
grams run at normal speed. 

The Software Carousel in- 
cludes slick touches like pro- 
tecting you from accidental re- 
booting (essential when many 
programs are loaded at once). 


nj'fi F A C T 
Dial F I L E 


Software Carousel 
SoftLogic Solutions Inc. 

530 Chestnut St. 

Manchester. NH 03101 
(603)644-5555 
List Price: 54'). 95 
Requires: 256K RAM. hard 
disk drive, DOS 2.0 or later. 

In Short: Fast. ea.sy switching 
between programs through 
memory partitioning. Copy 
protected for three installations. 
CIRCLE 622 ON REAOen SERVICE CARD 


letting you name partitions, and 
writing the partition name 
above the DOS prompt in each 
partition. You can automate 
each partition to load the pro- 
gram you want into it by setting 
up Soft^wre Carousel to exe- 
cute the equivalent of a batch 
file when you activate a parti- 
tion for the first time. 

Since the key combinations 
that select partitions can be ei- 
ther the Ctrl. Alt, Left Shift. 
Right Shift, or Break keys in 
combination with the function 
keys, there need be no keyboard 


incompatibilities with your fa- 
vorite programs. 1 had no prob- 
lem running XyWrile III, BA- 
SICA, Webster's New World 
Spelling Checker, and Power- 
base all at once on a 640K-byte 
XT using 640K bytes of hard 
disk space as virtual RAM. 

At least one program does 
conflict with Software Carou- 
sel: SideKick. A call to SoftLo- 
gic Solutions' support line con- 
firmed that the company knows 
about the problem and plans to 
fix it in the next release. For reg- 
istered users who can't wait. 


SoftLogic Solutions maintains a 
special bulletin board that con- 
tains the absolute latest, as-yet- 
unreleased versions of the pro- 
gram that may (or may not) 
solve any incompatibility you 
come across. 

If you want background pro- 
cessing and true multitasking, 
go elsewhere. If you want to 
max out your hardware's capa- 
bilities and make quick, ea.sy 
switches between several pro- 
grams, Software Carousel 
might be the $49.95 bargain that 
you’re looking for. 


strike Out Those Typos 

BY JANET LEWIS 


If you’re a lousy typist, or a lazy 
one. a memory-resident spell- 
ing checker like S&K Technol- 
ogy’s Strike is a nifty idea. It 
catches your typos as you make 
them, and you don't even have 
to leave your file. 

At least two other companies 
also thought of this idea: Bor- 
land International offers Turbo 
Lightning and Cornucopia Soft- 
ware offers Whoops! (see PC 
Magazine. Volume 4 Number 
25 and Volume 5 Number 10, 
for reviews). But for many ap- 
plications, Strike could be the 
best of the three. It's great for 
floppy disk users because its 
49,()()0-word dictionary loads 
into only l05Kbytesof memory 
and requires no further disk ac- 
cess. And Strike tracks the 
.screen, not the keyboard; it’s 
not fazed when you backspace 


or delete — maneuvers that can 
throw Whoops] for loops. 

Strike doesn’t claim to rival 
Turbo Lightning as a general in- 
formation-retrieval interface. 
But since its memory-resident 
dictionary is more than triple the 
size of Lightning's largest 
(which takes 106K bytes with 
the program), it will beep less 
often for correct words it simply 
doesn’t know. 

Big User Dictionary 

When Strike does beep, you 
can add correct words to a user 
dictionary with up to 3,000 
words — more than most spellers 
allow. You can also add words to 
the main dictionary, using a 
unique utility that packs them 
into Strike's compressed format. 

If the as-you-type beeping 
bugs you, you can toggle it off 
and use Strike's paragraph or 
full-screen modes instead. The 


:iTf 4 F A C T 
« F 1 L E 


Strike 

S&K Technology Inc. 

4610 Spoiled Oak WtKHls 
San Anionio.TX 78249 
(5I2)492-.3384 
List Price: $29.95 
Requires: I05K RAM. one 
disk drive. 

In Short: A speedy memory- 
rcsidenl spelling checker for 
floppy disk users, pixu lypisls. 
and middling spellers. Its sim- 
ple algorithm for suggesting 
alternative spellings makes it 
less useful for lousy spellers. 
Not copy protected. 

CIRCLE 621 ON READER SERVICE CARO 


screen checker just highlights 
your mistakes; you have to 
move the cursor to fix them, and 
the highlighting disappears at 
the whim of your word proces- 
sor. The paragraph checker, 
however, moves the cursor 
from mistake to mistake, and 
the highlighting stays until you 
leave the paragraph. 

Strike will list alternative 
spellings for unknown words 
and do replacements in your 
text. But if you’re a terrible 
speller and want an electronic 
desk dictionary. Strike isn’t for 
you. It simply .suggests all valid 
words that involve changes, ad- 
ditions. or deletions of one letter 
or transposition of two adjacent 
letters. That method covers ty- 
pos you could fix yourself or 
simple one-letter mistakes, like 
independance, forrest, or re- 
cieve. It's not helpful if you take 

(eondnues) 


TffBBSWUgMIlMCHt.r 


TWWimajTwyi 


TK« fuick kroHR fox ju*fe4 ovr _ 


i?rw aniCH MrI*; 43iXiI sniiiii! 


I Word Processor: UordStsr 
Current Word: lowrl 


Check Current Word 
Check Word At Cursor 
Check Uord Proa levkosrd 
Look Uf Siai ler Words 
Add To User Pictioners 
ConP ifuretion r — 

I Alt: Exit 


When Strike catches you in a typo (using WordStar in this example t, it gives you five 
options for dealing with it. all handled by function keys. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
60 







DATA BASE MANAGEMENT 
ASHTON TATE 


dBase III Plus 

419.00 

GRAPHICS 


BORLAND INTERNATIONAL 


DECISION RESOURCES 


Reflex 

62.00 

Chartmaster 

230.00 

FOX 6 GELLER 


Diagram Master 

209.00 

QuickCode III 

145.00 

Signmaster 

175.00 

QuickReport 

145.00 

DIGITAL RESEARCH 


dGraph III 

145.00 

Gem Draw 

159.00 

LEADING EDGE 


GRAPHIC COMMUNICATIONS 


Nutshell 

79.00 

Graphwriter Combo 

319.00 

M.D.B.S. 


Freelance 

239.00 

Knowledge Man (Version 2) 

299.00 

MICROGRAFX 


MICRORIM 


In-A- Vision 

279.00 

RBase 5000 

359.00 

PC Draw 

249.00 

Extended Report Writer 

89.00 

MICROSOFT 


MICROSTUF 


Chart 

209.00 

Infoscope 

125.00 

MOUSE SYSTEMS 


NANTUCKET 


PC Mouse + Or. Halotl 

119.00 

Clipper (dBase III Compiler) 

359.00 

PROJECT MANAGEMENT 

SOFTWARE TOOLS 

Viewgen (dBase III Screen 
Generator) 

49.95 

BREAKTHROUGH 

Timeline (Version 2) 

HARVARD SOFTWARE 

235.00 

WORD PROCESSORS 


Total Project Manager 

279.00 

LEADING EDGE 


MICROSOFT 


with Merge & Spell 

119.00 

Project 

249.00 

LIFETREE 


SCITOR 


Volkswriter 3 

129.00 

Project Scheduler Network 

329.00 

MICROPRO 


SORCIM/IUS 


Wordstar 

179.00 

Superproject Plus 

269.00 

Wordstar Propak 

249.00 



Wordstar 2000 

245.00 

SPREADSHEETS 


Wbrdstar 2000 Plus 

295.00 

LOTUS 


MICROSOFT 


Lotus 1-2-3 (Version 2) 

339.00 

Word V-3 

309.00 

Lotus Report Writer 

115.00 

MULTIMATE 


MICROSOFT 


Advantage 

309.00 

Muttiplan 

129.00 

Executive 

205.00 

SORCIM/IUS 


Just Write 

65.00 

Supercalc III Release 2 

189.00 

Muttimate 

219.00 


SAMNA 


COMMUNICATIONS 


SamnaWord III 

249.00 

HAYES 


Samoa + 

339.00 

Smartcom II 

95.00 

SATELLITE SOFTWARE 


MICROSTUF 


Word Petlect 4 1 

219.00 

Crosstalk XVI 

99.00 

INTEGRATED SOFTWARE 

Remote 

Transporter 

99.00 

145.00 

ALPHA SOFTWARE 


WOOLF 


Electric Desk 

189.00 

Move-it 

95.00 

ASHTON TATE 

Framework II 

389.00 

ACCOUNTING 


LOTUS 

Symphony 

449.00 

Q.N.P. 

C.P.A. + 

359.00 

SOFTWARE GROUP 


I.U.S. 

309.00 

379.00 

Enable 

339.00 

All Modules 

Payroll 


Easy Plus 


mmma 

OPEN SYSTENS 

All Modules Version 3 CALL HARDWARE 

Resource Manager 165.00 

HEALWORLD MONITORS 

All Modules 369.00 AMDEK 

AmdekSlOA 155.00 

PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES p,„cetok graphics 

BORLAND INTERNATIONAL Max12-E 165.00 

Editor 40.00 hX-12 475.00 

Gameworks 40.00 SR-12 565.00 

Graphix Toolbox 32.00 

Jumbo Pack 139.00 PRINTERS 

New Pack 55.00 r irnu 

S nn All Models CAU 

Turbo Toolbox 32.00 

Turbo Tutor 22.00 

With 8087 62.00 409.00 

With 8087 & BCD 79.00 ^<286 619.00 

LIFEBOAT ASSOCATIS “ 

Utlice C Compiler 279.0€ OKIDATA 

Run C 95.00 Models CALL 

MICROSOFT TOSHIBA 

C Compiler 249.00 '340 419.00 

Fortran Compiler 229.00 351 1275.00 

Macro Assembler 99.00 „c„niiv»un 

Quick basic 55.00 McMURTAND 

MULTIFUNCTION BOARDS 
UTILITIES AST RESEARCH 

80RLAN0 INTERNATIONAL Sixpak Plus w 64K 195.00 

Sidekick 32.00 Advantage w 128K 390.00 

Sidekick (Unprotected) 49.00 Rampage i« 128K 305.00 

Superkey 42.00 HERCULES 

CENTRAL POINT Graphics Board 319.00 

Copy II PC 29.00 CpIorCard 159.00 

Copy II Options Board 85.00 PARADISE 

PC Tools 29.00 Modular Graphics Card 245.00 

DIGITAL RESEARCH Five Pack with 0 K 120.00 

Gem Desktop 32.00 QUAORAM 

HFTH GENERATION Quadboard 64K 199.00 

FastCack 99.00 shjma DESIGNS 

FUNK SOFTWARE Color 400 445.00 

Sideways 30.00 TALL TREE SYSTEMS 

MICROSOFT JRamlllwOK 105.00 

Windows 65.00 

PETER NORTON MODEMS 

Norton Utilities 55.00 H^^ES 

1200 B 379.00 

QUAID SOFTWARE ^200 399.00 

Copywnte 39.00 

P'S*' 55.00 miscellaneous 

ROSESOFT KENSINGTON 

Prokey 89.00 Masterpiece 89.00 

SIMON 6 SCHUSTER KEYTRONICS 

Typing Tutor III 32.00 5151 Keyboard 175.00 

UNISON MICROSOFT 

Printmaster 32.00 Mouse 129.00 

PERSONAL MANAGEMENT CallforpricesonlBMcomputersystems 

CONTINENTAL SOFTWARE and for any item not included in this 

Home Accountant Plus 82.00 pricelist. 

LIVING VIDEOTEX? 

Ready 

99.00 

MECA 

Managing Your Money 99.00 

MONOGRAM 

Dollars And Sense 99.00 




Order desk & technical support open: 
8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday- Friday 
10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday 


6 9 V ; C A N B V Si. S 


ADVANTAGES 

• We welcome corporate 
accounts. 

• Free technical support. 

• Immediate replacement of 
defective goods. 

• Bulk discounts. 




TERMS: All prices subject to change No 
surcharge for VISA or MasterCard. 2% 
surcharge American Express. No re- 
turns without RA#. Short shipments 
must be noticed with 48 hours. 15% 
restocking fee on non-defective goods; 
13.00 C.O.D. charge. Shipping $4.00 per 
item, less on bulk orders. (18.00 Blue 
Label). 


CIRCLE 205 ON READER SERVICE CARD 






K K V I t: S IN B R i K F 


Strike 

(coniinuftti 

a wild Slab at a word you have 
no idea how to spell. 

Strike supports WorJSuir. 
Volkswriier. PeavhTvxt, 
PFSiWrite, DispiayWrite. Mill- 
tiMuie. and WordPerfect. You 
can use other ASCII programs 


BY VICTORIA DANQFF 

As banking by phone becomes 
more commonplace, home-ac- 
counting programs like Checks 
d Balances are finding their 
way into the software libraries 
of PC users. 

C <& B doesn't just balance 
your checkbook — it helps man- 
age your whole financial pic- 
ture. Two of its handiest fea- 
tures: it automatically updates 
your accounts with each trans- 


that don't steal keybt>ard inter- 
rupts. but all the features may 
not work. It's compatible with 
most other memory-resident 
programs. 

For typo trapping without 
pain. Strike is a gtXHl choice. 
It’s speedy, it’s cheap, and it 
gives you a lot of dictionary for 
the RAM it takes. 


action, and your account bal- 
ance is always on-screen. C<& B 
would be even nicer, though, if 
it could do what-if studies like 
other programs in its category. 

English Commands 

With its English commands 
and fast, on-screen, full-text 
editor, command-driven C & B 
is easy to use. To perform basic 
operations, all you need to re- 
member are six commands. A 
help screen lists the others. The 


manual is well organized. 

C & B00/.CS with flexibility. 
It will manage multiple check- 
ing accounts for a whole year 
and leaves ample memo space 
on each check. It has no rigid 
rules for establishing account 
budgets and categories — you 
can do as you please, when you 
please. It tracks up to 64 income 
and expense accounts (credit 
cards, utility bills, and so on) 
and can manage budgets for 
each one. as well as generate 
current, year-to-date, and year- 
ly budget summaries. You can 
also maintain multiple Rolodex 
files. 

C&B will also print any type 
of check: top or bottom stub, or 
no stub. It prints balance sheet 
and net-worth statements, as 
well as and reports covering any 
time period up to a full year. 

Once you get the hang of all 
the regular C d B features, the 
manual's advanced-features 
section tells you how to create 
batch files to make the program 
run fa.ster. track travel and mile- 
age. work from RAMdisks. set 


up multiple Rolodex files, and 
much mure . 

If you're looking for some- 
thing to help you with financial 
tracking and budgeting that 
won't put too big a dent in your 
time or your budget, try Checks 
d Balances. 


[•Ti; F A C T 
sroa FILE 


Checks A Balances, 

Version 3.6 
CDE Software 
948 Tutarosa Dr. 

Los Angeles. CA 90026 
(213)661-2031 
List Price: $74.95 
Requires: I92K RAM. two 
disk drives. DOS 1 .0 or later, 
in Short: A versatile home-ac- 
counting program that manages 
multiple checking, savings, and 
credit accounts, prints checks, 
and much imxe. Not copy pro- 
tected. 

CinCLE 620 ON READER %RVICE CARD 


CAecAs & Balances: 
Home Acanintbig 


Network Your PC For Only $79.95 


EasyLAN gives you the benefits of network 
ing your PCs at a fraction of the cost — S79.95 
per computer. 

► fasyiMf lets you share expensive print 
ers using standard print commands — at 
prices comparable to A B switch boxes. 

► fasyiAAfoperatesacrossasinglecommu- 
nications line, allowing you to transfer files in 
any direction. Every PC can be both a work- 
station and a server. 

► Network operations are user transparent 
and take place in the background. 

^ Modem access with auto dial and auto 
answer is standard. EasyLAN provides pass 
word protection, disk/directory access 
restrictions and file locking. 


Tf it does all you need why ^petid 
morel It is the ultimate example qf 
practicality in a local area network." 

— PCMaguin. 


InstalUtion and Operation 

Thousands ot EasyLAN networks have 
been installed using our Network Install Pro- 
cess. EasyLAN commands such as EZDIR, 
EZeOPY, and EZTYPE are almost identical 
to DOS. 



7 brought access to a laser jet printer 
JbrSSO. ’—CONOCO OU aser. 


Spedfleations 

► EasyLAN coaaecte up to 18 PCs, XTs, ATs, 
PCjrs or compatibles using RS232 cables and 
ports. PCs can also be connected using port 
selectors, and digital PBXs. 

► PCs operate to 19,200 baud; ATs to 
56,000 baud. 

► Memory required — 20K bytes per 
attached re. 

► It’s not copy protected. 


7 look for products that make my job 
easier and save my company money. 
EasyLAN does both." 

— Mini Micro Magazine. 


Product Support 

EasyLAN users have access to our respon 
sive, professional support staff and the 
24 hour on-line Product Support Center. 

‘The value is high, fi&fifi ’ 

— bfoWotM Report Card 


For Ordering & Configuration Heip Caii 

1800-835-1515 

In CA 408/738-8377 

Ask about EasyLAN evaluation package 

VISA MasterCard COD 

Saiople Mcefl & Order Fonn 

Amount 

$159.90 

$239.95 

(S' $79.95 ea. 

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$49.95 Qty 

TOTAL ORDER 

SetverTMaMlogr, lac., 1095 E. Duane Ave. Suite 107, 
Sunnyvale, CA 94086, 

Telex 5106003481 

In England, Tashkl Computer Ltd 01 •904-4467 


2 PC Network 

3 PC Network 
Additional PC’s 
2 Port Board 
30' Cable 


CIRCLE 520 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


OiVIjNl^fiSAD 


nilrWJzLri. 

NOW YOUR COMPUTER CAN READ. 

A REVOLUTION IN TAKING WORDS FROM 
PAGE TO COMPUTER. 


PC MAGAZINE 
PRODUCT OF ’85 

WORD PROCESSOR AND 
COMPUTER COMPATIBILITV . 

Thf OMNI-READER can read text into 
nioxt word pnK'essors, micro and per- . 
sonal computers. It attaches through a 
Serial RS232C interface as easily as a 
modem. 

lA PEKACE Ql Al.n V . 

OMM-READER has the ability to read 
the recottni/ed typefaces yyhich have dark 
hut fuzzy edges, often created by muitiple 
photo copying. 

I y PI I At I, Rl.t (XiM lION. 







10 DAY MONEY BACK GUARANTEE 



TO ORDER PLEASE CALL 
TOLL FREE 1-800-523-4898 
IN TEXAS 1-800-722-6013 

Accepting major credit cards - C.O.D.: 

Visa, Master Card, and American Z’ A VJ 

Express or .send money order or check to: VJ • x* • k^ • 
CIRCLE 173 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


INTERNATIONAL, INC. 

P.O. BOX 1282, EULESS, TEXAS 76040 


I hi- OMM-KI \I)1R coims 
|)ru|»n»nrimiim'(I to rca<! ftnir of the most 
coiniiioiil.N used l> pclaicv: Coiiricr Id. 

( oiiriur i2. l.itur (Jothic and Pristine 
i.lilu. 


MANUAL OPERATION. 

Alpha or numeric print is scanned line by 
line by moving the reading head along 
the text. Capable of scanning both for- 
wards and backwards, the reading head 
can lie used to input all or selected pro- 
lioiis of text. 


(il'li)E RUIzE. (pat. applied for) 

A spicialh engineered guide rule makes it 
easy to align text. Because of the unique 
clock track, the reading head can be 
moved at variable speed and still read 
text. > ^ 

Each OMM-READER comes with I.B.Mr^^^^ 
PC' or Apple Mclntoch software - at no I 
extra charge. ■ 






Lotus 

Lotus 

dBase III 

Framework 

MultiMate 

<219 

Word 

1-2-3 

<319 

Symphony 

<449 

Plus 

<369 

II 

<369 

Perfect 4.1 

<209 


Etoftware 


Word Processing Editors 
FANCY FONT 
FINAL WORD II 
MICROSOFT WORD 
MULTIMATE 
MULTIMATE 
ADVANTAGE 
OFFICE WRITER/ 
SPEUER 
PFS: WRITE 
SAMNA WORD III 
THINK TANK 
TURBO LIGHTNING 
VOLK8WRITER 3 
VOLKSWRITER 
SCIENTIFIC 
WORDPERFECT 4.1 
WORDSTAR 2000 
WORDSTAR 2000« 
WORDSTAR PRO 
XrWRITE III 


Database Systenis 
ALPHA DATA BASE 
MANAGER II 
CLIPPER 
CONDOR III 
CORNERSTONE 
DBASE III PLUS 
KMAN 2 
PARADOX 
PFS: FILE/PFS: 

REPORT 

POWERBASE 

OAA 

QUICKCOOE III 
OUlCKREPORT 
R BASE SOOO 
REFLEX 
REVELATION 

Spreadsheets/ 
Integrated Packages 

ENABLE 
FRAMEWORK II 
MVELIN 
LOTUS 1-2-3 
MULTIPLAN 
OPEN ACCESS 
SMART SYSTEM 
SPREADSHEET 
AUDITOR 
SUPERCALC 3 
SYMPHONY 


t119 

I21B 

1239 

$219 


$239 
$ 99 
$2S9 
$109 
$ S9 
$1S9 

$259 

$209 

$249 

$209 

$2S9 

$239 


$179 

$3S9 

$339 

$2S9 

$309 

$209 

$499 

$109 

$199 

$199 

$1S9 

$1S9 

$359 

$S9 

$499 


$349 

$309 

$S49 

$319 

$13S 

$299 

$489 


Graphics 

CHARTM ASTER 
DIAGRAM MASTER 
EXECUVISION 
ENERGRAPHICS 
FREELANCE 
GEM DRAW 
GRAPHWRITER 
COMBO 
IN-A-VISION 
MS CHART NEW 
OVERHEAD 
EXPRESS 
PC DRAW 
PC PAINTBRUSH 
PFS: GRAPH 
SIGNMASTER 


$219 

$199 

$249 

$179 

$209 

$149 

$290 

$299 

$189 


$ 99 
$ 89 
$149 


Project Management 

HARVARD TOTAL 
PROJECT MANAGER $279 
MICROSOFT 

PROJECT $249 

PROJECT SCHEDULER 
NETWORK $339 

SUPERPROJECT * $209 

TIMELINE 2.0 $299 


Languages/Utilities 

CONCURRENT DOS 
CM C COMPILER 
FASTBACK 

LATTICE C COMPILER 
MARK WILLIAMS C 
MICROSOFT C 
COMPILER 
MS BASIC COMPILER 
MS FORTRAN 
NORTON UTILITIES 
QUICK BASIC 
TURBO PASCAL 
XENIX 


$179 

$299 
$ 99 
$209 
$319 

$249 
$249 
$229 
$ 99 
$ 79 
$ 49 
$CNI 


Accounting 

BPI 

GREAT PLAINS 
lUS EASYBUSINESS 
ONE WRITE PLUS 
OPEN SYSTEMS 
PEACHTREE 
REAL WORLD 
STAR ACCOUNTING 
PARTNER II 


$299 

$479 

$309 

$199 

$409 

$259 

$399 


Communications/ 
Productivity Tools 
CROSSTALK 
PROKEY 
KEYWORKS 
RELAY GOLD 
REMOTE 
SMARTERM 
SMARTCOM It 
SUPERKEY 

Statistics 

SPSS/PC 
8TATPAK-NWA 
STATPAC GOLD- 
WALONICK 
SYSTAT 


$ 99 
$ 89 
$ 59 
$149 

122 


Desktop Environments 

DESK ORGANIZER $ 69 

GEM DESKTOP $ 39 

SIDEKICK $ 39 


Network Applications 

DBASE III LAN PAK 
KMAN 2 

OPEN SYSTEMS 
RBASESOOO 
REVELATION 
WORDPERFECT 


$459 

$799 

$999 

$450 


Hardware* 


Multifunction Boards 

AST ADVANTAGE (128KI $359 

AST 6 PAK PLUS (OK) $229 

AST RAMPAGE PC $319 

AST RAMPAGE AT $499 

GOLD OUAOBOARD (OK) $419 
INTEL ABOVEBOARD PS 
(04K) 

JRAM AT-3 (OK) 


$329 

$239 

$179 

$279 

$459 

$099 

$549 


ORCHID 
(OK) 

ORCHID ECCEL (OK) 

PC TURBO 2M (OK) 

PC TINY TURBO 2M 
PERSYST TIME SPECTRUM 
(304K) $279 

OUAOBOARD (aa4K) $249 

SILVER OUAOBOARD 
(OKI $219 

TECMAR CAPTAIN 

$209 


(304K) 


Display Boards 
HERCULES GRAPHICS 
CARO 

HERCULES COLOR 
CARO 

PARADISE COLOR/ 
MONO 

PARADISE MODULAR 
GRAPHICS 
OUADRAM EGA*^ 
SIGMA EGA 350 
SIGMA COLOR 400 
STB EGA PLUS 
TECMAR GRAPHICS 
MASTER 

TSENG ULTRA PAK 
TSENG ULTRA PAK-S 


$259 

$379 

$379 

$449 

$399 

$469 

$429 

$309 


Monitors 

AMOEK 600/722 $429/539 

NEC MULTISYNC $599 

PRINCETON HX-12 $449 

PRINCETON MAX-12E $179 

PRINCETON SR-12 $579 

PRINCETON HX-12E $539 

PRINCETON HX-9 $529 

TAXAN 122 AMBER $199 

TAXAN 630/040 $469/539 


Networks 

AST PC NET $CNi 

ORCHID PC NET $CNI 

3 COM SCO 


Emulation Boards 

AST 5251-11 * 

AST 5251-12 
AST BSC 
AST SNA 
CXI 3278/9 Phit 
IRMA 
IRMALINE 

Modems 

AST REACH 1200 
HAYES 1200 
HAVES 1200B 
HAYES 2400 
HAYES 2400B 
TRANSNET 1000 
VENTEL 1200 
HALF CARD 
WATSON 


Mass Storage/Backup 
EXCEL STREAM 60 TAPE 
(INT) $899 

IOMEGA BERNOULLI 
BOX-KKIO $2399 

IRWIN 310A 10MB TAPE 
(EXT) $850 

IRWIN 110D 10MB TAPE 


$649 

$499 

$489 

$599 

$849 

$799 

$999 


$349 

$579 

$549 

$279 


(INT) 

MOUNTA 


^ . $1199 

OUNTAIN DRIVECARD 
20MB $899 

PLUS HARDCARD 10MB $069 
PRIAM 42MB AT $1295 

SYSGEN SMART IMAGE 
20 MB (INT) $025 

TALLGRASS $C«II 

TECMAR OIC-60AT TAPE 
(INT) $1199 


Prinlers/Plolters 

BROTHER TWINWRITER $939 


OIABLO 
EPSON FX-OS 
EPSON FX-266 
EPSON LO-800 
EPSON LO-1000 
HP 7475A 
JUKI 0300 
NEC 3550 
OKIDATA 192 
OKIOATA 193 
Tl 805 

TOSHIBA P321 
TOSHIBA P341 
TOSHIBA P351 


$CaH 

$399 

$589 

$589 

$729 

$CNI 

$699 

$869 

$379 

$519 

$1025 

$565 

$829 

$1069 


Input Devices 

KEYTRONICS151 $179 

KOALA $109 

MICROSOFT MOUSE $129 
PC MOUSE W 

PAINTPLUS $139 


Accessories 
CURTIS SURGE 
PROTECTORS $CNi 

OATASHIELO BACKUP 
POWER $Cafl 

GILTRONIX SWITCHES $€«■ 

MASTERPIECE PLUS $135 

MICROFAZER INLINE 
BUFFERS $C«I 

TRIPPLITE BACKUP 
POWER $CNI 

250K RAM SET $ 39 

8007 MATH CHIP $139 

80287 MATH CHIP $199 


NEC 

Multisync 



Quadram 
^ EGA 


<379 


Princeton 

HX-12E 

$539 



LOWEST PRICE 
GUARANTEE!! 

We will match current 
nationally advertised 
prices on most products. 
Call and compare. 


JRAM AT-3 

<239 


Diskette 
Library 
Case 
with your order 


IRMA 

Board 

<799 



TERMS 

Checks— allow 14 days to clear Credit processing— add 3% COO orders— cash. 

M Oor certified check— add S5.00 Shipping and handling UPS surface— add S3.0C 
per Item (UPS BiueSS 00 per item) NY Stale Residents— add applicable sales tax. 
All prices subject to change 


n-SOO-SS^-nSBO 

In New York State call (718) 438-6057 


WS3M 


MON.-THURS. 9:00AM-8:00PM 
SUN. & FRI. 9:00AM-4:00PM 



Softline Corporation 
P.O. Box 729, Brooklyn, N.Y. 11230 
TELEX: 421047 ATLN Ul 
FAX: 718-972-8346 
















mSTDIE 
YOU SAW 
THE ALPS. 



Only $995. 





Manufactured by Alps 

Fully compa tible 



Electric, a $1. 5 billion 

with all the most 



Japanese maker of computer 

popular business PCs 

Built like a tank. 

and electronic products. 

and software. 




and member of the 
International Fortune 500. 


Welcome to the Alps. 

The Alps P2C)00'“ and new P2100'” 
Dot Matrix Printers. They just may 
be the perfect printers for a department 
full of PCs. 

They're fast. 'The P2100 prints 


drafts at an amazing 400 characters per 
second (cps), the P2000 at an almost 
amazing 250 cps. 

They're reliable. With normal care, 
they'll la^ for over five years without 
a breakdown. 



IHEYARE. 


Sold, serviced and 

supported in the Very fast Top speed 



Likewise. Only $1, 595. 


And they're versatile. They'll 
print most anything, and run with all 
the most popular PCs and software. 

Now, if you'd like to explore these 
Alps further, our free tour begins on 
the next page. 


It's your chance to see something 
you probably don't see every day. 

Printers that work as hard as you do 







MECl 

nSIlNGUU 


Diagnostic seU-test A choice oi paper 

signals errors with feeding controls, 

flashes and beeps. 



12 pushbuttons 
control printing 
functions. 


Lets you feed paper 
line-by-line, by 
1/216-inch increments, 
or continuously. 


The first thing that sets Alps 
printers apart from similarly-priced 
models is their sheer wealth of printing 
fimctions. And the ease with which 
you can perform them. 

For example, you can change type 
styles or print modes without getting 


involved in lengthy software com- 
mands. Just push a button on the front 
panel instead. 

Which is about all you'll ever have 
to do to handle any Alps printing job. 
Whether you're feeding paper in 
1 / 216 -inch increments or reprinting 




OUR 

HEDBRNEL. 

Clears print buffer 17 LEDs indicate 

of data without functionsin 

printingit. operation. 



Automatically reprints 
data stored in print 
buffer. 


Select type styles, 
printing modes, print 
pitches and spacing 
quickly and easily. 


Boy, is it fast. 400 cps 
in draft mode. 


data stored in the print buffer. 

The built-in print buffer (4K 
expandable to 256K) also frees up 
your PC for other jobs while the Alps 
is stiU printing. 

And in the unlikely event of an 
operating error, our panel will imme- 


diately diagnose the problem and 
inform you. 

With distinguished beeps and 
flashes. 



Can print 6-part iorms. 


FEED IT 


fivnc* _ 

■ ‘ Af.PS 

n.tAH nkwiT MrwtNi to 

‘ Bk1 1K1 

r\SAM MtMTtAVMNT to 

ALPS 

MUf HIl A 

rtiAM aiHtt to 

to •Ok 

AXPS 


i 

t C***-0*1 

i ta 

, • oo\n \ loooo^ i 

" 1 

[ f MiJi* \ »/*/•* \ 

1 - 

1 « \ 11 

1 ' nooo 1 120^* 1 ^2000 

acn twTMi* miNttA 


3 standard paper 
feeding methods, 
including top, bottom 
and rear feed. 



ALPS P2H)0\ 



Most business printers are very 
picky. 

They simply refuse to deal with 
some of the jobs you have to deal 
with. Like printing on heavy stock. Or 
on oversized sheets. 


But Alps printers are different. 
They're made to print almost 
anything your business will ever need. 
From letters and graphs to six-part 
forms and 16 -inch-wide spreadsheets. 
And they not only handle most 



iM\/ninF 
INVOICE 


16.5-inch carriage 
handles paper irom 


Paper-thickness 
adjustment enables 
printing on heavy stock. 


Paper-saving 
push/ pull tractor teed. 


You won't believe 
how last it is. 4(X)cps. 


everything, they handle it more 
efficiently. 

Both come with a built-in two-way 
tractor feed (push and pull) that saves 
paper other printers would normally 
waste. Plus a choice of three different 


paper feeding methods, all standard. 

AU in all, you'd be hard pressed 
to find printers with a greater appetite 
for work. 



TURN 



P2000 prints at 
speeds of 250, 125 
and 50 cps, fast 
enough for high- 
volume work. 




P2100 prints at speeds 
of 400, 200 and 80 
cps, fastest in its 
price range. (We're 
not kidding, it's fast.) 


ALPSpjml 




Kept adequately fed, Alps 
printers will handle more work than any 
printers in their class. 

Each offers a choice of three 
speeds. AU fast. 


The P21C)0 prints drafts at 400 cps, 
memos at 200 cps and letter-quality 
documents at 80 cps, while the P2000 
prints at 250, 125 and 50 cps in its 
three modes. 


SrawME 


3 print modes: 
drait, memo and 
letter quality. 


Precision-engineered 
print head is designed 
lor high-speed, 
heavy-volume 
printing. 



4K print buffer 
(expandable to 256K) 
can store up to 
128 pages. 


So either printer can easily take 
on all the work an office full of PCs can 
dish out. 

And they'U take care of it faster, 
thanks to time-saving features Like a 


built-in tractor feed, expandable print 
buffer and multiple type font cartridges. 

In fact, for heavy volume work, 
Alps printers stack up favorably against 
much more expensive machines. 


LISTEN TO 


Superb print quality 
in all three printing - 
modes. 


A)ps America 

Morvi r irsi Slrtel 

SanJow.CA 


Can-Oo ComputifO 
27 Cattai Street 

KaneM ettv. Mwwa 66222 


Dev Mr CanOtemen 


IMS la to inlorm you that yovr oraer tor 2000 Alps P2000 printers ano 
2100 Aloe P2I00 Vinters is now being processea 


sev shipment will be sent m about a week s titne. so you can aspect 
aeiwery well betve the end of tms month 


Alps prmtva v« made to print almost anything ebusiness will e yer ne ett 
From letters ano gripnics to 6 pvt forms and i6-inch*wiai apreaasheais 


And they re made to vmt It all fast V The P2l00hBsa top speedot 400 
characters per second, while the 02000 prints at 260 eps 


in addition, both models are ertremeiy reliable with normal care, thoyil 
print over five years without a breakdown 


It s been a great pleasure oomg business with you. and we nope to continue 
doing so m the fwlve biease be sire to visit ua the ne»t time you're m 
California 


Rugged printhead 
has hie span of over — 
200 , 000,000 
characters. 


One-year warranty. - 



With normal care, 
will last overlive years 
without a breakdown. 


1 VL.PS I 


Even when the volume's up all the 
way, you won't hear much. Because 
Alps printers are built to print up a 
storm without sounding like one. 

Every open space is covered with 
sound-absorbent layers, keeping 
noise in and dust out. 


But Alps printers aren't just built 
to nm quietly. They're built to nm a 
long, long time. 

Our precision-engineered print 
head will deliver over 200 million 
characters of superb output. No matter 
how hard you work it. 


nnsBAGE. 



Have we mentioned 
how fast it is? 


Built like a tank, but 
doesn 't sound like one. 


Sound -absorben t 
layers ensure quiet 
operation at noise 
level under 55 dBA. 


What's more, if you give our 
printers normal care, they'U give you 
over five years of trouble-free printing. 

Which is not surprising when 
you consider that they're built by Alps 
Electric, a $1.5 billion Japanese 
company that's been successfully 


manufacturing computer printers for 
over a decade. 

And though our printers are quiet, 
we're sure you'll be hearing a lot 
about them from now on. 



” • ' ►rr-^ - 

•' — 



Copyrightod maiw'al 


SEE 

THE ALPS 
AND SEE 
THE ALPS. 
FREE. 


The one thing better than an Alps 
demonstration on paper is an Alps 
demonstration in person. 

Especially when it could get you 
a free trip for two to the Japanese 
or Swiss Alps. For 10 days. With all 
expenses paid, including airfare, hotel 
and meals. 

Just fill out and send in the attached 
coupon. Or, if it's been removed. 


you can call or write us at the address 
shown below. 

We'll then contact you to arrange 
a free demonstration of the Alps P20C)0 
or P2100 at your convenience. And 
we'll enter your name in our drawing 
for a free Alps vacation. 

After all, anyone working without 
an Alps printer could certainly use 
a vacation. 


ALPS 

AMERICA 


3553 North First Street 
San Jose, CA 95134 
(800) 828-ALPS 
In Caliiomia, (800) 257-7872 


P2000 and P2100 are trademaika of Alps Electnc Ca, Lid. 
C 1986 Alps Amanca. 






TLOOK 


FOR PRODUCTIVITY IN A PRODUCT. 




Vi'- 


L 




The purchase of a 
data base system 
should be the beginning 
of a relationship. 

That relationship should 
include planned product 
upgrades, experienced 
technical support, vertical 
application templates, infor- 
mational seminars, training 
programs, user groups, 
newsletters, special market- 
ing programs. . . and much, 
much more 

Demand a Relationship 

At Software Solutions, the 
relationship begins as soon 
as you contact us. We’ll 
help you find answers 
to your questions about 
DataEase™— or about 
any information manage- 
ment issue 

The product evaluator at 



SEE US AT 
PC EXPO 
^edOTH 
1335 


Manufacturer's Hanover 
Trust summed up the expe- 
rience of tens of thousands 
of users by calling DataEase 
“the most impressive pro- 
ductivity tool I have seen.” 

When you talk to us, ask for 
our sample diskette See for 
yourself why Data Based 
Advisor points to DataEase 
as "the easiest to understand 
and use full-featured data 
base program,” calling it "a 
program which could easily 
set the industry standard.” 

Discover us. Find out how 
important the company 
behind the product can be. 


Send information and a tree DATAEASE 
sample diskette for my PC (check one): 

□ IBM □ WANG □ DEC □ Tl 
Include maten^ relating lo: 

□ Corporate Oienl □ Retailer 

□ MlSflDP/IC Professonai □ VAD 

□ Olher 


Name 

Title 

Company.. 
Street; 


City: State: . 

Mail to: 

Software Solutions, Inc. 
12 Cambridge Drive 
Trumbull, a 06611 


-Zip:. 


Telex: 703972 

800 - 243-5123 





Software Solutions. Get into a relationship that works for you. 

OflnoOa 

Compuiertviks, Ibronta Ontano, |416) 231-1270 

Un4Bd Kngdom West Gemiany, Austria Scandinavia 

S^iphre Systems. Essex, 01-554-0562 M&T Softviere Viedag, Munch, 0694613^ Vyiest Soft A/S, Alesund, Noniey, (47) 71-46166 


Swcertand, France 

Softsource. S.A 1209 Genave Switzerland, 965l52&da5-153 


CIRCLE 193 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


With all these SoftLogic Solutions, 
you could run out of problems. 

Now there’s a whole family of low-cost, easy to use Soft logic software for the IBM PC, XT, AT, and compatibles. 

They’ll save you time, aggravation, and lots of money. Got a problem? Check out these Softlogic Solutions. 



Software Carousel— The easy way 
to move from one program to another. 

What a hassle. Saving, exiting, loading, retriev- 
ing— just to move from one application to 
another. With Software Carousel, you can keep 
up to ten programs loaded and ready to run. 

Best of all, you can use all your memory in each 
and every one. Supports AboveBoard" and 
RAMpage7 too. 


Disk Optimizer— Speeds up your 
disk by cleaning up your hies. 

You may not notice, but your hard drive is get- 
ting slower. Because your files keep getting frag- 
mented and scattered on your disk. Reading, 
writing, everything takes longer, because your 
disk is working harder. Disk Optimizer puts back 
the speed by putting your files back in one 
piece— where they belong. 




Cubit— Packs more of your data 
onto less disk space. 

Filling up your hard disk again? Don’t run out 
and get a bigger drive. Get Cubit, and get up to 
twice the storage capacity from the drive you 
already have. Cubit compresses and decom- 
presses word processor, spreadsheet, database, 
all kinds of files— quickly, safely, invisibly. 


DoubleDOS— The multitasking 
software that takes less of everything. 

You can spend more money, load more memory, 
and read more manuals with systems like Tbp- 
View"* or Windows? Or you can get Double- 
DOS, the amazingly simple concurrent software 
environment that lets you and your computer 
each work on different tasks at once. Nothing 
could be easier. And nothing costs you less. 



Put your problems behind you. Order these SoftLogic 


Solutions today. 


$49 


95 * 

Each 


*Plus SS.OO shipping handling. 


So why put up with problems? Especially when you 
can get dependable SoftLogic Solutions for just 
$49.95* each. Ask for SoftLogic products at your 
computer dealer. Or order directly from SoftLogic 
Solutions by calling 800-272-9900 (603-627-9900 in 
New Hampshire). 

ScrrLoGic 

SOLUTIONS 

CIRCLE 288 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


Order today: 
800 - 272-9900 

SoftLogic Solutions, Inc. 

530 Chestnut Street 
Manchester, NH 03101 
800-272-9900 (603-627-9900 in NH) 













’ * r ■ 

KHAKCOa*'*® TB 

M EGlV , COlGM^ 


ure 

4 ^ 

>00 


SiSff”- 

I00»/oj“^ colors - 

16 I Alette 

• Pixel panning 

• split screen ^^2000 

• custom V ^ ^ng 1^6 
Chip Set ’^!^o/b EGA 
provides li^^palibility 

• Miicro-^^^ 

^TLSter 


132 ui 1 ^'’® 

S.UMH 

TEXT , 

Spreadsh^^ lators 

,FBESF n ^ , 

• Up to 165t-^f. 


For Desktop 

publishing 

Applications 


Labs Vnj;:owaPMS9« 


SSfeu 


Emulates 
« 1 ^ ^/A\v&.re 


, OtHaloE«"'P'®°'' 


Emulates • 

Hardware 

. SUPPORT®' 

Hercules . 

nK&as 


aseKE"^ More Than 

HiSr 


“’IfAbout^^^Su 


(BM EGA ts TM ol IBM Corp 
EVA'- Enhanced Video Adapter 
Or Halo IS TM of Media CyOernetics 
Hercules a TM of Hercules Computer Twhnology 
ET 2000 is TM of Tseng Labs. Eva a TM of Tseng Labs 

'Superset Features are Fully Software Programmable 


ENHANCEMENT TECHNOLOGY FOR PERSONAL COMPUTERS * MADE IN THE USA 


CIRCLE 119 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



12 MHz SPEED . . . 

. . . plus A MEGABYTE FOR DOS! 



THEY ALL NEED NUMBER SMASHER/ECM" 


Turn your PC or XT into the machine It should have 
been! The 12 MHz Number Smasher/ECM is the fastest 
acceleratoron the market It is aiso the most powerfui, provid- 
ing a true megabyte for DOS! 

To break the 640K DOS barrier MicroWay designed a 
Memory Management Unit (MMU) that is tailored to DOS 
pius a 2000 byte resident driver- MegaDOS”. MicroWay 
calls this breakthrough Extended Conventionai Memory. 
When you type CHKDSK with the board instaiied, your sys- 
tem will report 1,036288 bytes total memory and 1,010,016 
bytes free! Any conventional DOS program can utilize a full 
megabyte for data or code without changing a byte. 

Downloading a mainframe application? ECM memory 
runs with any program that uses DOS for screen services 
including RM and MS FORTRAN and MS and LATTICE C! 
This means you have an additionai 384 K avaiiabie for over- 
sized appiications. Programs which write directiy to the 
screen requirea simple patch to adhere to the new standard. 
MicroWay has aiready developed patches for the Lotus, 
WORDSTAR and AUTOCAD screen drivers. Reiease 1 A of 
1-2-3 jumps from 535,516 to 916,444 bytes available and 
njns faster than Release 2 for most worksheets. 


Number Smasher/ECM is 100% compatible with all 
hardware and software including E MS and EGA boards. The 
compatibility is a resuit of control: its speed is switch, key- 
board or software selectabie from 4.77 MHz to 12.0 MHz. 
Applications which have not been upgraded to ECM can stiii 
be run by setting DOS to 640 K or 704 K and using the 
memory above DOS for i/0 enhancers. 

Number Smasher/ECM runs floating point bound pro- 
grams fasterthan an AT oranyother80286 based machine. 
In fact. Number Smasher's 12 MHz 8087 runs a factor of 
three faster than the standard 80287 on the AT, delivering up 
to 125 kflops. Software is included for RAM DisK print 
spooler, and disk caching, which speeds up floppy and hard 
disks by a factor of 2 to 1 0! 

Number Smasher/ECM Is the most cost effective pro- 
ductivity tool you can buy. The base board which runs at 
9.54 MHz comes with 51 2 K and costs only $599! The com- 
plete system which includes a motherboard accelerator, one 
megabyte of memory and a 1 2 M Hz 8087 is just $1 1 99. Call 
today to discuss your particuiar configuration. Remember. 
“The advantage of buying from Micro Way is outstanding per- 
sonal sen/ice" (PC Magazine, 6/1 0/86 - p. 1 62) 


fllCfU 

The World Leader in 8087 Support 

Vav 

P.O. Box 79, Kingston, Mass 02364 USA (61 7J 746-7341 
Tempo House, London, U K. call 01-223-7662 


Number Smasher. ECM and MegaDOS are trademarks of MicroWay. Inc. MicroWay Is a registered trademark of MicroWay. Inc. 


CIRCLE 318 ON READER SERVICE CARD 







V I K W P () 1 N T S 

■ FROM THE EDITOR’S SCREEN ■ BILL MACHRONE 


How WE SELECT 
EDITOR’S CHOICE 
PRODUCTS 

When PC Magazine conymres products, it pinpoints the best of the breed in each category by 
awarding it the Editor's Choice. Here’s how we make our selections. 



E ditor’s Choice. That's what we call 
the best of show in our comparison 
reviews. Whether we're comparing 
two products or twenty, there’s a product 
that is more worthy of your notice than the 
others. Sometimes there are several. In 
one recent case, our review of MS-IX)S 
portables, there were none. This last ex- 
ample was more a case of minimizing neg- 
atives than of maximizing positives. 

We felt strongly then, and still do. that 
the industry had not applied state-of-the- 
art engineering, construction, and materi- 
als techniques to the problem of taking a 
DOS-compatible machine with you. 
When the insides of portables start looking 
more like cameras and less like battle- 
ships. we'll know that the manufacturers 
finally understand the problem. 

Obvious answers aside, we get the 
question continually: How do you select 
the Editor's Choice? Well, it’s like high 
school — if you’ve done your homework, 
the rest is easy. 

CRITERIA The Erst thing is to know the 
ground rules. What are the criteria for 
judging a product? What actually makes 
the product useful to you? To answer these 
questions we look at our own use of the 
products and talk to users, information 
center managers, and the manufacturers. 

In fact, “Call the manufacturer" is 
Rule I in our review procedure. It’s so im- 
portant that it’s also Rule 2. Time was 
when a magazine would take a product and 
conduct its review in secrecy. While we 
still don’t tell the manufacturer what we’re 
going to write, we do call and discuss our 


findings. There ate times when the prod- 
uct’s performance is grossly at odds with 
its claimed or perceived quality. We want 
to know why because our readers will 
surely ask. Other times it doesn’t work the 
way they say it should. The documentation 
may be bad, or we may be using it incor- 
rectly. In any event, we call the manufac- 
turer. 

Sometimes a product is miscategorized 
by its manufacturer. Sometimes it is com- 
pared with famous products that it doesn’t 
belong in the same room with. The product 
in question may be better or worse than 
said famous product. But there is a distinct 
tendency in our business to compare ap- 
ples and oranges — which leads naturally to 
categorization. 

CATEGORIZATION One of the most 
important things to understand about a 
product is whom it is intended for. Too 
many products don’t differentiate them- 



selves adequately by identifying their target 
audience. If we see a product for which we 
or the manufacturer can’t adequately identi- 
fy that audience, warning bells go off. 

Aside from apples-and-oranges com- 
parisons (PFS: File and Report versus 
dBASE III, for example), the intended au- 
dience makes a big difference in the level, 
completeness, and organization of the doc- 
umentation. It can also influence support, 
multicopy pricing, and update policy. 

It wouldn’t be fair to .select as Editor’s 
Choice a product intended for the corporate 
audience over one intended for persotial use 
because the documentation was more com- 
plete. Each should compete with others in its 
class. When we rounds up EGA-compati- 
ble cards, we felt several were praiseworthy, 
but for different reasons. Some had more 
perfonnance per dollar, others emulated the 
EGA more closely. 

MEASUREMENT You can’t just plug 
in a bunch of EGA cards and declare one 
the winner based on documentation or 
looks. Contributing editor Charles Petzold 
spent many hours poring over the IBM 
^A BIOS determining exactly how the 
board was supposed to perform under a 
wide variety of (often undocumented) con- 
ditions. Then he wrote programs to exer- 
cise the boards and test the efficiency of 
their BIOS’s, and only then did he judge 
their compatibility. ^ 

When Petzold ran into a problem, he 
called the manufacturer to discuss the | 
problem. More often than not, the conver- g 
sation resulted in our being shipped a new | 
board or a new BIOS chip, often within 24 i 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST l')«6 
83 




\ M- w r () I N r s 


■ FROM THE EDITOR’S SCREEN 


hours. After the tests. Pclzold commented 
that he wished we had an Editor's Choice 
category for Best Engineer. 

Where possible, we try to use industry- 
standard benchmark tests for evaluating 


products. For example, we based our re- 
cent roundup of surge suppressors on the 
IEEE-587 specification. But this is a 
young industry. Sometimes our quest for 
benchmark tests takes us into virgin territo- 



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PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST I 
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FTC 


SYSTEMS 


ry. as with the EGA boards. Other times, 
we reject the industry-standard benchmark 
tests as being unrealistic. 

Printer speeds are an ideal example. 
The common measurements concern 
themselves only with how quickly the 
printhead can spew out characters. They 
limit themselves to horizontal motion, 
while vertical motion (the printer’s ability 
to roll the paper through the carriage) actu- 
ally has the greatest effect on throughput. 
With a little research, we found that the av- 
erage business letter was a page and a half 
long. The PC Magazine Labs printer 
benchmark test is now used by printer 
manufacturers everywhere to gauge their 
products' performance. Basically, it mea- 
sures the time it takes for a printer to pro- 
duce a page-and-a-half letter. 

SPEED ISN’T EVERYTHING But the 
Editor's Choice isn’t necessarily the print- 
er that cranks out the letter the fastest. As 
concerned as we are about performance, 
we’re not blinded by it. As you know, we 
continue to heap praise on the IBM Pro- 
printer. It has the best combination of fea- 
tures and performance in its price class. 
Recently, the IBM engineers who de- 
signed the Proprinter told us that our print- 
er "blockbuster" issues from 1984 and 
1985 were the standard reference from 
which they selected the features and mea- 
.sured the performance against which the 
Proprinter would have to compete. They 
targeted well. Not only did the Proprinter 
gamer top honors in our last printer round- 
up, but we haven’t seen anything to knock 
it off its perch in the intervening year. 

The kind of rapport that we establish 
with manufacturers before and during test- 
ing is unusual for a computer magazine. 
Our interest, after all, is not to put down 
bad products but to ensure that the ones 
you buy ate the best available. To that end, 
if we can help the manufacturer build a bet- 
ter product, we will. You benefit. We ben- 
efit. The industry benefits. 

We give away our benchmark test disk 
at trade shows, causing giant, aisle-clog- 
ging jams. The programs are on many bul- 
letin boards and can be found in informa- 
tion center software libraries nationwide. 

The Editor’s Choice is there to serve 
you — it’s an express route to the bottom 
line. Eli I 


9 8 6 




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I FIND OUT FOR YOURSELF. Returnthiscouponwlthyourpaymentof $199 (plus $12.50 
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Intel announ 



Midtifunction 




ijjjuuj. 




Look who’s joined forces. 

Expanded memorj^ and multifunc- 
tion features for your AT. 

Introducing Intel’s Above” Board 
PS/AT. 

Like our Above Board /AT, PS/AT 
gives you expanded memory-which 
meets the LotusVIn tel/Microsoft* spec, 
conventional memory— up to 640K,and 
extended memoiy— capable of support- 
ing protected mode operating systems. 


But unlike Above Board/AT, j 
PS/AT gives you all that memory '/ 
phas serial and parallel ports, 
print buffer, and RAM disk. 

All packaged into a single slot. And 
all guaranteed to run at SlVfflz. 

PS/AT not only supplies all the 
memory you need, it’s supported by 
some of the most popular software. 
Including 1-2-3* Symphony" FVamework 
IIT Supei€alc' Ready.Tand Auto CAD" 


Lotus is a registered tra(l<*mari( of Lotus Development Corporation. Microsoft is a rej^tered trademark ofVficrosoftCorporatioR 1-2-3 is a registered trademarit of Lotus 
r>*velopment Cor^joration. S\ niphi my is a trademark of Lotus Dev’elopment Conwratiott. FVamework 11 is a trademark of Ashton-T^te. Su|)erCtUc is a reftistered trademark 
of Computer Associates Intentional. Ready! is a trademark Living Videotext, Inc. Auto CAD is a trademark of Autodesk, Inc. Ofikr Valid Jurte 23-Sc^inber 1986. 











And it’s supported by somebody else, Microsoft* Windows, 
too. Us. With a free hotlme, 5-year war- Ebr details call (800) 538-3373. 

ranty-just what you’d expect from the So buying an Above Board PS/AT 

company who cast the standard in not only means one less board to buy 
expand^ memory Fbr a short time, it also means one 

And if you’re still on the fence, try less coprocessor to buy 
this on for size: Proof liiat it pays to consolidate. 

Buy an Above Board by September 
30, 1986, and well throw in an Intel 8087 
or 80287 IVfeth Coprocessor, free. 

Plus a special offer for a free copy of 

Good only in USA, Canada, and USA territories. Vc^ where prohibited, taxed or restricted by law. Valid for all versions of Abow Board. Redeemable only through Intel. 
Above is a trad«nari( and Intel a re^tered trademark of Intel Corporation. 0 1986 Intel Corporation. 



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One Plus $1 Equals Two. 


IBM’-Compatible 



Full-featured 
word processing 

• Split Screen 

• On-line Help 
Restore Deleted Text 

• File Conversion 

• Automapc Backup 

• Extensive Printer Support 


Professional-level 

Spreadsheet 

• Reads and Writes 
I -2-3* files directly 

• 15 Types of Graphs 

• No Copy Protection 
• 2 and 3 Dimensional 

Graphs 


We have an unusual business proposipon to make. 


If you buy the Twin” spreadsheet for $99, 
we'll throw in Leading Edge* Word Processing 
for just $ I more. 

Add it up for yourself. The Twin is amazingly 
similar to Lotus 1-2-3! It organizes, calculates 
and analyzes data like Lotus 1-2-3, but offers 
even better business graphics capabilities. 

Plus, there’s Leading Edge Word Processing. 
It was recently named "Editor’s Choice" by PC 


Magazine over a handful of word processors 
costing several hundred dollars. We’ll sell it to 
you for $1 when you buy the Twin for $99. You 
get these two full-featured, IBM'-compatible 
software packages for what you’d be lucky to 
pay for one somewhere else. 

It’s an unusual business proposition that’s an 
unusually good deal. 


Call I •900-343-3436 for a dealer near you or to order direct. In MA call 
(617) 449-4655. Visa and AAasterCard accepted. 

Call today. 

Monday-Friday 9 a.m.-8 p.m., Saturday 9 a.m.-5 p.m. (EST). 
Sunday I p.m. - 6 p.m. 


A Leading Edge Software Products Inc. 

21 Highland Circle 
. Needham Heights, MA 02194 

Leading Edge and logo are registered trademarks of Leading Edge Products. Inc Twin Is a trademark of Mosaic Software Inc. 

Lotus l-T-S is a registered trademark of Locus Development Corp. IBM is a registered trademark of Intemational Business Machine Corp. 



CIRCLE 271 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


VIEWPOINTS 


JOHNC. DVORAK 


Ibm product 

CFNTFRS- 

THE FINAL ANALYSIS 


With this issue, John C. Dvorak begins a new column, bringing a new perspective on the PC 
arena. And look for his Inside Track into the computer industry on the following page. 



I was disappointed to see little or no 
analysis in the press of the recent sale 
of the IBM Product Centers to Nynex. 
We heard variously that IBM wasn’t mak- 
ing money on the Centers, might have bro- 
ken even, might have made a little money, 
or who knows what'? What does this bode 
for retailers (or the industry) in general? If 
IBM can't make it, then who can? 

Well, it seems that IBM never intended 
to make money on the Centers. Corporate 
insiders tell me that the IBM Product Cen- 
ters were expendable less than a year after 
the first store was opened in Philadelphia 
in 1980. By 1981, IBM was already seek- 
ing to either sell the individual stores to 
employees or to franchi.se them. 

The stores were developed as a direct 
result of IBM’s no-layoff policy and the re- 
organization (or. rather, elimination) of its 
Office Products Division (OPD). “IBM 
had a lot of typewriter salesmen all over 
the country. This was inefficient. It hoped 
to put some of them in the Product Cen- 
ters. then phase them out of the company, 
since none of these guys knew much about 
selling computers,” one observer told me. 
The new emphasis for office sales would 
not be in retailing through .storefronts, but 
in selling over the phone (telemarketing) 
combined with direct mail. 

Since this new direction meant a lot of 
office sales employees would eventually 
be jobless. IBM prayed that some employ- 
ees might want to buy a store. 

As OPD was being dissolved, IBM 
hired a large market research firm to create 
a slide show presentation to demonstrate 
the benefits of entrepreneurial activity to 


these employees and tell them about op- 
portunities in the teal world. The underly- 
ing suggestion: Get a real job! Then some 
executives got cold feet, thinking that 
someone might misinterpret the blunt slide 
show. Perhaps IBM didn't want to even 
suggest that an employee wasn't wanted. 
So the presentation was never given, and 
IBM went ahead with the Product Centers 
and put these people to work in them. IBM 
still hoped that either some of these guys 
would quit, or that it could sell the stores to 
these employees along with the promi.se of 
an IBM dealership. 

THE LONG GOODBYE It never hap- 
pened. The typewriter salesmen weren’t 
the kind of guys who wanted to be in busi- 
ness for themselves. They liked the steady 
paycheck and the prestige of being an 
IBMer. IBM tried for 5 years to get rid of 
the Product Center stores because they in- 
terfered with its VAD/VAR sales, Compu- 


■ IBM Product Centers 
were developed as a direct 
result of IBM’s no-layoff 
policy and the 
reorganization of its 
Office Products Division. 


lerLand sales, and its own telemarketing. 
Meanwhile, no one could figure out why 
anyone would buy from the stores. The 
Prtxluct Centers weren’t allowed to dis- 
count or to wheel and deal. Still, some of 
them racked up over $4 million in annual 
.sales. Not shabby at full margins, no mat- 
ter what the rent. It's amazing how much 
magic there is in the three letters. IBM. 

Finally, IBM sold the 84 stores (actual- 
ly. 8 1 stores and 3 locations that have to be 
moved) to Nynex, which had seen other 
Bell holding companies (like Pacific Tele- 
sis) making waves, so it got the nerve to 
expand in a big way. 

IBM surprised its Atlanta headquarters 
with a same-day announcement. After all, 
the company seemed sincerely interested 
in retailing. The last store was just opened 
in Torrance, California, a few months pre- 
viously. in August 1985. “The employees 
in Atlanta were steamed up by the sudden- 
ness of the sale," said an IBMer at the At- 
lanta headquarters. 

Meanwhile, if you carefully read 
IBM’s announcements about the sale of 
the stores, you’ll find heavy emphasis on 
the fate of employees. IBM Corp. is push- 
ing them at Nynex. Nynex wants them, but 
the Product Center IBMers are resisting 
and will probably have to be scattered 
around the country. Talk about loyalty! 
This will leave Nynex up a creek. There is 
a genuine shortage of qualified eomputer 
store floor personnel. 

After all is said and done, storefront re- 
tailing and IBM go their separate ways. It 
was an exercise in futility; no reason to 
panic, and nothing to contemplate. 


PC MAGAZINE 


AUGUST 1986 


MicroCom Syatcnu 

OUTSTANDING 

SOFTWARE 

For IBM PC's and Compatiblet 


$350 


PER 
DISK 
SMALL QUANTTriES 


$300 


PER 
DISK 
FORTnOAMORC 


Q CAO 1 — Altamira. an object oriented CAO 
program, and Supergrapb 3 

□ COMM 3 — Commuracatorts utilities to be 
used with OMODEM or PROCOMM 

□ DATABASE 3 ~ The Pbase relational 
database manager with query language 

H RNANCE - 12 rtems) PC-Accountant and 
a personal finance manager 

□ GAMES 1 — Chess, 3-0 Packman, Kong, 
Spaceware. Janitjoe, and more Graphics 

□ GAMES 2 — Oubert, Pango, Centipede. 
Monopoly. Zoarre. and more Graphics 

□ GAMES 3 — Blackjack (you set rules). Arm 
Chair OB. and Empire (war game) 

n GAMES 4 — Star Trek, the original Collossai 
Caves ADVENTURE, and Castle 

□ GAMES $ - The HACK adventure game 
from the universities Like Rogue 

□ GAMES 6 - Pinball. Othello. Oagons, 

Sopwith (tly one), and more Graphics 

□ GAMES 7 — Round42 (16 color graphics). 
Backgammon. Risk, and more Graphics 

□ LANGUAGE 2 - The renowned SMALL-C 
compiler and a C interpreter' 

□ LANGUAGE 3 - 8086/8088 assembler, 
disassembler, and tutorials 

□ LANGUAGE 4 - 370 assembler language 
on the PC' A must for 370 users 

□ LANGUAGE $ Turbo Pascal interactive 
debug, pop-up help, formatters, etc 

Q MUSIC 1 — Many clever tunes, and an 
excellent cotor graphics music editor 

□ ORGANIZER 1 - DESKMATE. a sidekck 
Clone, and the JUDY calendar program 

Q ORGANIZER 2 — Project management using 
critical path scheduling 

□ ORGANIZER 3 - The PC-OUTLINE 
windowing outline editor 

Q PICTURES 1 -■ From Vader to Snoopy, char 
graphics pictures for your printer 

□ PICTURES 2 High res digitized color 
graphics pictures Graphics req 

Q PINUP 2 - Provocative high res aigtlized 
color graphics pmups Graphics req 

□ PRINTER 1 - The complete printer kit 
spoolers, banner makers. ar>d more 

□ SPREAD 1 The PC-CALC spreadsheet 
program 

□ UNIX 1 — A Unix command shell and various 
Unix commands for DOS 

□ UTILITIES 1 -- A collection of invaluable 
general purpc^ DOS utilities 

Q UTILITIES 2 — More invaluable wnerai 
purpose utilities including NEWKEV 

□ UTILITIES 3 A comprehensive set of 
debugging and diagnostic utilities 

□ UTILITIES 4 Ultra File Utilities, like Norton 
Utilities for diskettes 

□ WORD 2 - Waterloo Script (like iBM s 
SCRIPT) text formatter for the PC 

NEW (LATEST) RELEASES - 

□ COMM 1 ~ The ever popular OMODEM 20E 
modem communicaiions program 

□ COMM 2 PROCOMM 2 3. an excellent 
modem program with terminal emulation 

M COMM 4,S.6.7 (4 items) Latest RBBS 

Bulletin Board System 14 1A 

^ DATABASE 1,2 (2 items) File Express 3 7. 

menu driven database manager 

0 EDUCATION 1 Interactive DOS tutorial tor 
new PC users 

□ LANGUAGE 1 The artificial intelligence 
languages LISP (XLISP 1 6) and PROLOG 

0 LANGUAGE 7 Pascal interpreter Great tor 
learning/debugging Pascal 

0 WORD 1 PC-WfllTE 2 6. a powerlui 
complete word processing system 

0 WORD 3 The PC STYLE writing style 
ar^aiysts program 

Cost of Disks 

CA Res 7% Tax 

Ship/Handlirtg V P9 

C Enclosed _ 

MicroCom Systems I 

P.O. Box S16S7, Psio Alto. CA 94303 

CIRCLE 299 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


■ JOHNC. DVORAK 




tf'. i 


V I h W l» 0 I N T S 



Inside track 

With Boeing’s new entry, the 3-D spreadsheet comes of 
age. And an amazing name generator is introduced. 


L ix)k for a flurry of inlerest In 3-D 
spreadsheets over Ihc next 6 months 
or so. It's probably the only interesting 
thing happening in the moribund 
spreadsheet business. 

Three-dimensional spreadsheets 
aren't new. There have been a few nota- 
ble versions of the idea over the la.st few 
years. (The most reeent is Paperback 
Software's VP Planner. ) But the market 
hasn't shown much interest yet, since 
many users are still trying to cope with 
the two-dimensional concept. 

If you don't understand 3-D spread- 
sheets. think of a 2-D spreadsheet as a 3- 
by-5 card containing data written in cells. 
In 3-D you have a stack of such cards. In 
a 3-D spreadsheet model, each imagi- 
nary card can access data from every oth- 
er card. Hhink the best use is in a corpo- 
ration for departmental budgeting. Each 
department would have a standard 
spreadsheet template for its budget. The 
division head could then load each de- 
partment budget into a 3-D model and 
analyze numbers like crazy. As it’s 
done now, each department makes a bud- 
get, then the totals are reentered into a di- 
visional spreadsheet. 

Anyway, expect renewed interest be- 
cause of a product from Boeing Comput- 
er Services, up in Seattle. Boeing devel- 
oped. in-house, a whiz-bang Lotus 
iookalike spreadsheet that uses virtual- 
memory techniques and works in three 
dimensions. It’s definitely a superset of 
the Lotus spreadsheet. I prefer it to VP 
Planner, which is also 3-D but not as 
comfortable to use — don't ask me why. 
The Boeing .spreadsheet uses no over- 
lays. so it’s big. Real big! It’s 450K bytes 
and obviously requires a hard di.sk. I used 
it effortlessly. It can make a spreadsheet 
that is 64 megabytes large, too! Talk 
about an auditor's nightmare. 


I visited Boeing to get a gander at this 
thing. The product is tentatively called 
Boeinffialc, an ugly name. Insiders are 
trying to get it changed to 747 — the Pow- 
er Spreaisheet. since 747 connotes big, 
powerful, reliable, and fast. The price is 
hovering around $399. It's written in a 
Boeing version of Pascal. 

While this thing is hot, the company is 
not. I found Boeing to be typical of old 
indu.strial companies. Spell it S-T-O-D- 
G-Y. When I visited the 747 plant, one of 
the largest buildings in the world. I was 
shocked to find cheap Woolworth-type 
oil paintings in the main lobby. There 
were a couple of cheap couches there 
too, the kind you see on the porch of a 
shack in Appalachia — no kidding! Are 
these guys out of it or what'? I'm used to 
Silicon Valley elegance. Spell it C-H-R- 
O-M-E. My suggestion: spend a few 
bucks. Grow some ta.ste. 

The personnel were like the furnish- 
ings. I think the main topic of conversa- 
tion is whether quadraphonic sound is a 
viable alternative to stereo. A status sym- 
bol is a Benrus watch with a twist-o-flex 
band. The big controversy is whether to 
ban rock and roll because some kid was 
knifed recently at a Judas Priest concert. 
It's pathetic. 

So it remains to be seen whether 
Boeing can sell micrtxompuler software 
from an old-fashioned perspective in a 
modem world. If it can, then watch Lo- 
tus do it one better. 

Genuinely Interesting Software 
Dept. Once in a while you hear about a 
program that sounds corny or mickey 
mouse or user group city. You don’t take 
it seriously. That was my initial take 
when I first heard about a software prod- 
uct called Namer. But once I used the 
thing, my mind changed — fast. I was as- 
tonished by its capabilities, and I can un- 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
90 


V I I'. W I' t) I N I S 


derstand why many advertising agencies 
(including J. Walter Thompson) have 
been playing with it. It generates product 
names, slogans, kids' names, and other 
great names! 

What it does best is come up with 
weird product names or intriguing 
company names or names for evil sci- 
eiKe fiction characters. 

You select from a connotation menu. 
You can connote hi-tech, low-tech, old- 
fashioned, spiritual, stuff like that. You 
pick a couple of connotations to get your 
names. Its database of plain words, pre- 
fixes, suffixes, and Latin roots is tremen- 
dous. The program puts a word together 
from pieces to create a new word. 

When 1 used it to create a high-tech 
name combined with devious connota- 
tions, I got product and company names 
like NoneStar, Neuroclud, Clamotech, 
Plegicene, Dynalust. Compulep. Pole- 
maquant. and Photigon. There were 
hundreds more! "Yes, the new Veno- 
maprobe from Toxidyne Corp. is the an- 
swer to the population explosion. A new 
Plegicene era will be upon us. ” 

Combining high-tech with spiritual at- 
tributes, I got names like Hydrichron, 
Xenosoft, Octamind, AsteraCalc, and 
Alphangel . The.se ail sounded like cheap 
pulp science fiction names. "The Al- 
phangels attacked us from the planet Hy- 
drichron, Captain! What are we going to 
do? Dare we launch the Octamind ?’ ' 

Other combinations of this and that 
produced Flickadot, Easibound, Welli- 
pun. Joycntss, Slimapop (yum!), Blas- 
toglow. and Cretobene. You can make 
up your own jokes for these names. Dy- 
namite software! While Namer isn't 
cheap at $235 . it's a must for the creative 
types out there. The company offers a 2- 
week money-back guarantee. Namer is 
available from Salinon (which must have 
used its own product and then selected 
the wrong option to get that name) Cor- 
poration. 7430 Greenville Ave., Dallas. 
TX 75231. Phone them at (214) 692- 
9091. W 


At last! - Fast, On-screen 

FLOWCHARTS 

And Organization Charts 


Finally! An on-screen flowchart proc- 
essor that knows about flowcharts and 
organization charts - not just another 
“screen draw" program that makes you 
do most of the work. 

Interactive EasyFlow Is a powerful 
full-screen graphics program dedicated 
to flowcharts and organization charts. 
With this program you can quickly com- 
pose charts on the screen. More im- 
portant, you can easily modify charts so 
they are always up to date. 

Features: • Text is automatically 
centered, character by character, within 
shapes as you type it • Text formatting 
controls allow you to over-ride the auto- 
matic formating where desired • Lines 
are created by specifying the starting 
and ending points - the program auto- 
matically generates the route • Power- 
ful editing facilities allow shapes and 
even entire rows and columns of shapes 
to be inserted or deleted: lines are auto- 
matically re-routed as necessary 
• Large chart size (up to 16 shapes 
wide by 16 shapes high) allows very 
large flowcharts and organization charts 
to be handled with ease • Charts can be 
larger than the screen - the window into 
the chart scrolls both horizontally and 
vertically as necessary • Flexible print- 
er interface allows it to work with all 


printers, not just dot matrix printers. 
Wide charts can be printed in strips Also 
works with Hewlett-Packard 7475A (and 
compatible) plotters • Twenty standard 
flowcharting shapes included • Com- 
mon shapes supplied in three sizes 

• Extensive manual (125 pages) in- 
cludes many examples • Context 
sensitive “help" facility provides im- 
mediate assistance at any time • Any 
number of titles can be placed on a chart 

• Commentary text blocks can be 
placed anywhere in the chart • Fast: 
written in M88 assembler • Plus many 
more features than we can mention 
here. 

Requires at least 256K memory, DOS-2 
or higher and an IBM or Hercules com- 
patible graphics card. 

Order direct for only $149.95 + $2.00 
S&H (USA/Canada), $10.00 (foreign). 
Payment by MO, check, VISA, COD or 
Company PO. Rush orders accepted 
($15.00 S&H; USA/Canada only). Rush 
orders received by noon will be delivered 
the next business day (to most 
locations). 

The sample screen display shown below is typical o1 
what you see while editing a chad. Other screen dis* 
plays are provided for entering titles, changing 
options, getting 'help' and so on 


STATUS BAR (not to be 
confused with a wet bar) tells 
you vifhat Interactive EasyFlow 
is doing at all times. 


TEXT/MESSAGE 
WINDOW used to enter 
user text and to display 
messages from Interactive 
EasyFlow. 


CURRENT SHAPE 
WINDOW • shows the 
content of the current 
flowchad shape (the one 
under the SHAPE 
CURSOR) in complete 
detail. 


HavenTree Software Limited 

P.O. Box 1093-P 

Thousand Island Park, NY 13692 
(613) 5Ai-6035 ext 49 


CHART WINDOW gives an overview of your chad; this 
example shows the ''rK>rmar view. ‘Close-up ’ view shows a 
smaller pad of the chad in more detail. 'Wide-angle' view 
shows a larger pad of the chad at reduced size. 



SHAPE CURSOR shows where you are in 
the chad. Cursor keys move it around; chad 
window scrolls if you run off the edge of the 
window. 


CIRCLE 201 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
91 



The new Version 2 

ixLYNX 

Trackball 

a quality product 
from Honeywell 


GeJOrganizcd! 


A Productivity Tool 
For Applications Software 




E nhance your efficiency on spread- 
sheet, data base and word processing 
software with a professional cursor ' 
control device made for the IBM PC/XT™ 
and other 100% keyboard compatibles. 

Stop hitting arrow keys, quit jumping in 
and out of NUM-LOCK...get on the 
/uLYNX ball and find out what cat-like 
cursor motion is all about. Move up to a 
higher level form with microprocessor 
intelligence that will allow you to purr 
across the screen instead of just mousing 
around. 

/iLYNX piggybacks with your keyboard, it 
DOES NOT use up a serial port. 


yuLYNX comes with a software driver for 
text or graphics mode to emulate either 
keystrokes or mouse commands. /iLYNX 
lets you customize a button function and 
cursor rate template, then save it right 
with your program. /^LYNX has a pop-up 
macro menu for the advanced user. 
mLYNX sits where you need it without 
taking up a lot of desk space. )uLYNX is 
simple to install and even easier to use. 

/Li LYNX... for the serious user of practical 
software who wants to enhance 
action and productivity. 

Honeywell 

^ Disc Instniments Subsidiity 

Dealer Inquiries Invited 



— — — Limited Time — Special Offer 

Receive a /zLYNX version 2 Trackball, including software... PC Paintbrush^** and Graphics Driver! 

ALL FOR JUST $169^^ OR $139^^ WITHOUT PC PAINTBRUSH! ORDER NOW!! 

Contact your local dealer for a demonstration of the /li LYNX Trackball. If he does not yet carry the m LYNX, ask him to 
call us. You can also order the /iLYNX directly from us by mail or phone. 

MAIL PHONE 

Send check or money order,* in the amount of $169.00 (California Call directly to place Mastercard. Visa or C.O.D. order: 

residents add 6.5% sales tax) plus $4.00 shipping and handling for In California, 714-979-5300 Ext. 223 

eacn unit, to: Outside California, 800-824-3S22 

Honeywell/Disc 

102 E. Baker St., Dept. MX Offer ends 7/31 /flo. Void where prohibited. 

Costa Mesa, CA 92626 "C.O.D. orders also accepted by mail. 


CEMDRAW IS 4 Irulrindrk of Digitil Research Inc SIDEKICK it a Iradrnurk of Borlandlnd. Mulliplan ita trademarkuf MicrotufiCuip DESQitairademarkof Quarterdrck. Cel Organizedisa tradrmarkof Elrclronk 
Arts. P.C. Painlbruth ita trademark of ZSofi Corp. Lolut l-ZOand Symphony are Irademarktof Lotus Development Corp. Framework it a trademark of Ashton- late. IBM-K'/XT is a trademark of IBM Corporation. 

CIRCLE 170 ON READER SERVICE CARD 






The big news in 
Ibshba 3-in-One 
technology is 
small. 


Toshiba's S-in-One™ printer technology gives 
you speed, letter-quality type and high-resolution 
graphics. All in one highly reliable machine. Which may 
be why more people choose Toshiba 24-pin printers 
than any other. 

And now you can get this proven tech nology in a 
new compact-size printer the P321. At a compact price. 

TheP321 uses thesameToshiba-develop^ 24- 
pin print head that has set the standard for the industry. 
It produces letter-quality documents at 72 CPS, draft 
quality at 21 6 CPS and accurate, dot-addressable 
graphics. And our print head lasts four times longer in 
frie process. 

Qume Sprint 11 emulation and a wide selection 


of plug-in type fonts are standard features on the P321 . 
And you can get IBM Graphics Printer emulation and 
downloadable type fonts on diskette as options. 

All these features and options in such a compact 
size and price and IBM-compatibility make the P321 
a perfect choice to use with your PC. 

If you need to do full-size spreadsheets, the 
Toshiba P341 is the way to go. It has the same capabili- 
ties and features as the P321 but adds a wide carriage 
which easily accommodates spreadsheets. You can 
also add a bidirectional tractor feed or electronic inte- 
grated sheet feeder 

For the name of the authorized Toshiba dealer 
near you, call 1-800-457-7777 


In Tbuch with Tomorrow 

TOSHIBA 

TOSHiBA AMERICA. INC iNorrrttbon Syswre Oviaon 
CIRCLE 203 ON READER SERVICE CARD 






...ABOUT ANALYZING SSSi 

VOI TD riATA '^9 spreadsheet a little too 
ILfUIV L/r\l/\« thin. Or maybe you're starting 
from scratch. But if you're serious about data analysis, 
you're ready for SPSS/PC+'’ - a full software family that 
brings you five high-powered ways to complete any data 
analysis task. 

Enter it. SPSS/PC -i- Data Entry” -our latest option- 
takes the effort out of entering and correcting data. 

Analyze It. The SPSS/PC -i- Base Fbckage pro- 
vides a powerful array of statistical and reporting 
procedures. 

Examine it. SPSS/PC-i- Advanced Statistics' lets you 
get more serious with your data. 


Table it. SPSS/PC-i- Tables” produces presentation- 
ready tables instantly. 

Chart it. SPSS/PC-i- Graphics” featuring Microsoft* 
Chart creates show-stopping graphs and charts. 

SPSS/PC-I- products are being put to productive use 
by serious fact finders in business, government and edu- 
cation. For countless purposes such as market research. 
Wage and salary studies. Survey analysis. And quality 
control. Plus each product is superbly documented and 
supported by SPSS Inc., a leader in statistical software 
for nearly 20 years. 

So if you're serious about data analysis, step up to 
SPSS/PC-i-. For details, contact our Marketing 

Dep,,,™™ 1/312/329-3640 


SPSS Inc. • 444 North Michigan Avenue. Suite 3000 • Chicago. Illinois 60611 

in Europe: SPSS Europe BV • PO. Box 115 *4200 AC Gohnchem, The Netherlands • Telephone: +31183036711 • TWX; 21019 


SPSS/PC* runs on IBM PC/XT/AT^ with hard disk Contact SPSS Inc. ky compatible mcrocomputsrs SPSS/PC-* . SPSS/PC* Data Entry: SPSS/PC « Advanced Stsbslics. SPSS/PC^ tables and 
SPSS/PC* Graphics are trademarks of SPSS Inc. tor Its propnetary computer sottware. Chart and Micrc^t are Irademaiks of Moosott CorpoRttion 0 1906. SPSS Inc 

CIRCLE 172 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


NOBODY 

DELIVEBS LIKE LOGICSOFT. 



FREE OVERNIGHT 
DELIVERY 


LOWEST PRICE 
GUARANTEE 


TOLL-FREE 
CUSTOMER SERVICE 


Buy it today, use it tomorrow! 

Only Logicsoft ships your order the 
same day via overnight courier' Free. 

Nobody beats Logicsoft prices. 

In fact, if you find a lower price 
(advertised or a bonafide quote) on any 
of the hundreds of products we stock, 
we'll beat it by $10.+ Our Corporate 
Accounts Program offers attractive 
volume discounts. Credit cards and 
PO’s accepted. 

Outstanding customer service 
and technical support 

It’s only a toll-free phone call away. 
Another reason why Logicsoft is a 
major hardware and software supplier 
to over 50,000 companies, including 
over 90% of the Fortune 1000. 

See inside for the iowest prices 
on over 800 products for IBM- 
PCs and compatibles. 


’Applies 10 oroef toWing over SiOO. if under SiOO shipped 
UfS-~FflEE fWiihm Coni. U.S ). Due to weight restrctioos. printers 
end monitors arc atw shipped UPS-FREE fThts otter does not apply 
to Items under SUM. American Express or Terms orders in these m* 
stances . we will meet any lower price We raserw the nghi to rcQuesi 
a current written price quote 


110 Bi-County Boulevard, Farmingdale, N'V' 11735 


To order or receive technical assistance, call our National Hotline: 


NY STATE: 1-600-235-6442 (516) 2496440 
Customer Service: 1*800-431-9037 NYS: 516-249-8440 
FAX #516-249-5289 


No Surcharge for MasterCard v>SA. American Express, C 0 0. . money order check or PO s (pnase can lor price verdicatiOh) • No sales 
lax on orders shipped outside N Y State • Please add 2S lor insurance and handiino ($3 00 immmum) (nt'i orders add'O • We oo not 
ehU until we ship All products covered by mig's warranty Detective merchandise may be returned lor repair or exchange onFy We do not 
guarantee cornpaiabiiity Any goods returned tor credit art subieci to ai ISH restKkmg cnarge All paces and policies sublet to change 
without notice 



NOW LEASE 
OR PURCHASE 
SYSTEMS FROM 
LOGICSOFT. 

THE ECONOMY AND 
FLEXIBILITY OF A LOGICLEASE. 

High tech without high cost. Outstanding flexibility. Plus substantial tax 
benefits. Logicsoft’s new leasing program gives you them all and much more. 

Lease the computer system you need now for 36 months (customized lease 
programs also available) at one of our low, low rates. At the end of the term, 
you. can purchase the system for only 10% of the original purchase price. Or 
negotiate a lease extension. Give Logicsoft a call. We'll process your lease 
application in 24 hours. And deliver your system within three days. First 
and last lease payments required in advance. Lease proposals subject to 
credit approval. Rates based on current cost of funds. 

FREE 90-DAY, 

ON-SITE SERVICE ON ALL SYSTEMS. 

Whether you lease or purchase a system from Logicsoft, you get a unique 
bonus: a free 90-day, on-site system hardware service contract We've 
contracted with one of the nation’s largest and most respected independent 
computer maintenance firms to provide you free service in most metropolitan 
areas. If a problem arises, it will be corrected quickly and efficiently. At your 
faciiity. And at no additionai cost to you. There's no inconvenience of 
transporting your system to and from a service center Wherever you are. 

Whatever the problem. Expert assistance is only a phone call away. 



110 Bi-County Biud., Dept. 54321 
Farmingdale. NY 1 1735 
CANADA: 416-283-2354 
Domestic/Int’l Telex 
286905 SoftUR 


To order or receive technical assistance, call our National Hotline: 


1 - 800 - 645-3491 

NY STATE: 1-800235-6442 (516) 249-8440 
Customer Service: 1-800-431-9037 NYS: 516-249-8440 
FAX #516-249-5289 


EUROPE: 020-83 48 64 
Telex: 10759 Logic NL 
Mail orders to: 
LOGICSOFT EUROPE BV 
pb 9460, 1(X}6 AL Amsterdam, Holland 


Circle #400 on reader service card. 


AND A HUGE SELECTION 
OF PERIPHERALS. 


PRINTERS* 

CANON 

Bubble Jet BJ-80 $459 

EPSON 

LQ800 579 

LQ10O0 749 

RX-100 385 

FX-85 399 

FX-286 589 

JUKI 

6100 359 

6300 709 

NEC 

8800 1045 

Pinwriter P-6 Series 

Low Price Call! 

Pinwriter P-6 449 

Pinwriter P-7 635 

MANNESMAN TALLY 

MT-86 489 

MT-85 399 

OKIDATA 

182 Plug&Play 224 

192 Plug&Play 349 

193 Plug&Play 545 

2410 P Plug&Play 1759 

PANASONIC 


TOSHIBA 

P321 . . .. 
P341 .... 
P351 . . . . 
CITIZEN 


12 'Amber 300 A 
12'Amber310A 


135 

149 


CANON 

Laser Printer 

HEWLEH PACKARD 


OASYS 


NEC 

JC— 1401P3A 
Multi-sync color 
w/swivelbase 569 

IBM 

Color Monitor 539 

Monochrome Monitor . 2^ 

Enhanced Color Display 679 
PRINCETONE GRAPHICS 

RGBHX-12 419 

RGBHX-12E 535 

RGBSR-12 569 

RGBSR-12P 625 

Amber Max 12 165 

QUADRAM 

Amberchromel2'' 146 

EGA Monitor w/swivel . . 549 
TAXAN 

121/122 145 

620 415 

640 526 

MULTI-FUNCTION BOARDS 
AST RESEARCH 


PLOTTERS' 

FACIT 

4550 (6 Pen Plotter) . . . 
HEWLETT PACKARD 

7475A 

HOUSTON INSTRUMENTS 

DMP40 875 

DMP41 2599 

DMP42 2599 

DMP51 3949 

DMP52 3949 

MONITORS* 

AMDEK 

Color600 $389 

Color 722 509 

Color 725 Low Price Call! 

12* Green 300 G 125 


. 255 

Six Pack Premium .... 

. $389 

Six Pack Plus (384K) . . 

. 239 

a Call! 

Rampage W/256K .... 

. 269 

. 489 

Rampage(AT)w/512K . 

. 459 

Advantage (I^K) .... 

. 369 

. 795 

I/O Mini Half Card . . . . 

. 119 

999 

I/O Plus II 

EVEREX 

. 125 

. 259 

Magic Card II W/384K . 

. 199 

. 349 

TECMAR 



Captain (384K) 

. 219 

479 

OUADRAM 


. 479 

Quadboard(384K) . . . . 

. 269 


Silverboard 

EMS 

. 235 

$1995 

W/256K 

. 349 

Liberty (AT) W/128K . . . 
INTEL 

. 315 

2569 

Above Board (PC) .... 

. 275 

3399 

Above Board (AT) 

. 435 

1699 

Above Board (PS) 64K . 

. 329 

Above Board (PS) AT 



256K 

8087 Math 

. 429 

$ 395 

Co-Processor 

80287 Math 

. 129 

1699 

Co-Processor 

. 209 


AST 


HERCULES 
Monochrome Graphics 

Card 

Color Card 

PARADISE SYSTEMS 


Modular Graphics Card 

249 

Coior/Mono 

159 

QUADRAM 


EGA Plus Graphics 

389 

SIGMA 


EGA Board 

375 

Color 400 (Princeton) . . . 

479 

STB 


Chauffeur 

255 

Graphics Plus II 

229 

EGA Plus 

319 

TECMAR 


Graphics Master 

439 

COMMUNICATIONS 

BOARDS 


AST 


5251-11 

$645 

DCA 


IRMA Board 

839 

MODEMS 


AST 


Reach 1200 Half Card . 

$345 

EVEREX 


Evercom II 

149 

HAYES 


Smartmodem300 .... 

145 

Smartmodem 1200 . . . . 

389 

Smartmodem 12006 


w/Smartcomll 

359 

Smartmodem 2400 . . . . 

599 

Smartmodem 2400B 


w/Smartcom II 

559 

PROMETHEUS 


Pro-modem 1200B 


w/software 

239 

QUADRAM 


Ouadmodem Series 


Low Price Call! 

VEN-TEL 


PC Modem 1200 Half 


Card 

365 

1200 Plus 

339 

PC Modem 2400 Half 


Card 

499 


MOUSE INPUT DEVICES 
MOUSE SYSTEMS 
PC Mouse w/DR Halo 2 . $135 
MICROSOFT 

Microsoft Mouse (Serial) 135 
Microsoft Mouse (Buss) 125 

SURGE PROTECTORS 
KENSINGTON MICROWAVE 


MEMORY STORAGE 
IOMEGA 

Bernoulli Box (10 -t- 10). $2329 
Bernoulli Box (20 Mb) . 2299 
Bernoulli Box (20 + 20) 3279 

HARD DISK DRIVES 
MOUNTAIN COMPUTER 
Hard Drive Card (20 Mb). $975 
Hard Drive Ciard (30 Mb) 

Low Price Call! 

PRIAM CORP 

60 Mb Internal Hard Drive 

1489 

lnnerspacelD40Mb . . . 1299 
PLUS ■¥ 

Hard Card 10 Mb 699 

TALLGRASS TECHNOLOGY 

Tc5525i25Mblnt 799 

SEAGATE 

10MbV2Htlnt 465 

20 Mb Va Ht Int 499 

20 Mb Full Ht (AT) 599 

30 Mb Full Ht (AT) 789 

40 Mb Full Ht (AT) 899 

60 Mb Full Ht (AT) 

Low Price Call! 

CORE 

20 Mb Int (AT) 1299 

30 Mb Int (AT) 1399 

40 Mb Int (AT) 1495 

72 Mb Int (AT) 2795 

CARTRIDGE TAPE BACK-UP 
EVEREX 

Excel Stream 20 Mb Int . $639 
Excel Stream60 Mb Int . 799 
Excel Stream 60 Mb Ext 929 
IRWIN 

Irwin 110 10 Mb Int 499 

20 Mb Int 595 

20Mb325(AT)Ext.D . . . 779 
SYSGEN 

Image Tape Backup 

10 Mb Int 789 

Image Tape Backup 

20 Mb Int 599 

Image Tape Backup 

20MbExt 699 

TECMAR 

QIC 60 AT 1250 

QIC 60 Ext Tape Backup 1599 
CORE 

60 Mb Ext 1599 

FLOPPY DISK DRIVES 



Masterpiece 

. $ 95 

Panasonic 360 K Vi Ht. 

. $119 


Masterpiece Plus . . . 

. 119 

TandonTM-100 360 K 


$249 

CURTIS 


F/Ht 

. 125 

Diamond 

. 39 

Tandon TM-100 360 K 


239 

239 

Emerald 

45 

'y^Ht 

. 105 

Ruby 

. 59 

ToshibaSeOK’/iHt. ... 

, 115 

KEYBOARDS 


BACK UP POWER SUPPLIES 


KEYTRONIC 


DATA SHIELD 


299 

5151 (Deluxe) 

. 169 

200Wt(PC) 

$249 

156 

5153 (w/touch Pad). . . . 

. 289 

300Wt(XT) 

359 


3270 PC 

. 245 

500Wt(AT) 

569 

169 

KeytronicJr. 5151 

. 169 

800Wt(AT) 

655 


’Due to wttigN restnctions. Pnntea Montcn are stepped UPS— free- Al pncts and pohctes subiect to cttan^e wttwut notice 


CANT FIND n7 ASK FOR OUR SPECIAL ORDER DEPT. 

There’s a good chance we do carry the product (we’re adding new ones every day). Or, we can get it 
for you from one of our suppliers — still at our low direct-to-you prices. 




Leading Edge 
NoddD 

• 256K Memory • Two 360K Half/ Height 
Floppy Drives • Four Expansion Slots • 
Keyboard • Text Display Card • High- 
Resolution Monochrome Monitor • One 
Parallel And Serial Port • Color option 
available 

• Purchase Price: $1,375 

Lease For $S9 per month 


M^IBMAT— iONb 

8 MHz • 512K • 30 Mb Hard Drive (Full 
Height, w/controller) • 1.2 Mb Half/ 
Height Floppy • Eight Expansion Slots • 
IBM Enhanced PC Keyboard • Serial/ 
Parallel Adapter • Free 90-Day, On-Site 
Sendee Contract • Color or Mono- 
chrome Monitor Available as Option 
• Purchase Price: $4,179 

Lease For $165 per month 


^ IBM XT— 20 Mb 

512K • 20 Mb Hard Drive • 360K Floppy 
Drive Half Height • Eight Expansion 
Slots • IBM Enhanced PC Keyboard • 
Asynchronous Communications Adapter 

• Free 90-Day, On-Site Service Contract • 
Color or Monochrome Monitor Available 
as Option 

• Purchase Price: $2,369 

Lease For $99 per month 



Meir GMnpaq Deskpro 
286— 30 Mb 


Meiif Compaq Portable II 
20Mb 


AT&T 6300 
Total Business System 


• 512K RAM Memory • 80286 Based 
CPU • One 30Mb Hard Drive (w/cpntrol- 
ler) • One 1.2 Mb Half/Height Floppy 
Drive • Eight Expansion Slots • Compaq 
Keyboard • Graphics Card • One parallel 
port • Free 90 Day On-Site Service 
Contract • Color or Monochrome avail- 
able as option 

■ Purchase Price: $3,859 

Lease For $152 per month 

Meur Compaq Deskpro 
20Mb 

• 640K RAM Memory • One 20Mb Hard 
Drive (w/Controller) • One 360K Floppy 
Drive • Eight Expansion Slots • Compaq 
Keyboard • Graphics Card.* One Parallel 
port • Asynchronous Communica- 
tlons/Clock Board • Free 90-Day, On- 
Site Service Contract • Color or Mono- 
chrome Monitor Available as option 

• Purchase Price: $2,299 

Lease For $99 per month 


• 640K RAM Memory • 80286 Based 
CPU • One 20Mb Half/Height Hard 
Drive (w/controller) • One 360K 
one/third Height Floppy Drive • Two 
Expansion Slots • Compaq II Keyboard • 
Text/Grahics Display Card • 9" Text/ 
Graphics Monochrome Monitor • One 
Serial and Parallel Port • 

Free 90-Day, On-Site Service Contract 

• Purchase Price: $3,879 

Lease For $153 per month 

Mew Compaq Portable 
286— 20Mb 

• 640K RAM Memory • 80286 Based 
CPU • One 20Mb Hard Drive (w/control- 
ler) • One 1.2 Mb Half/ Height Floppy 
Drive • Five Expansion Slots • Compaq 
Keyboard • Graphics Display Card • 9" 
Text/Graphics Monochrome Monitor • 
One Parallel Port • Free 90-Day, On-Site 
Service 

• Purchase Price: $3,898 

Lease For $154 per month 


• 640K RAM Memory • One 10 Mb 
Half/ Height Hard Drive (w/Controller) • 
One 360K Floppy Drive • Seven Expan- 
sion Slots • AT&T-Keyboard • High- 
Resolution Graphics Card • High-Resolu- 
tion Monochrome Graphics Monitor • 
Serial & Parallel Ports • Toshiba P-351 
Printer And Cable • Software Bundle 
(dBase III Plus, Lotus 1-2-3, Word Perfect, 
SideKick, G.W. Basic and MS-DOS) • Free 
90-Day, On-Site Service Contract 

• Purchase Price: $4,299 


Lease For $169 , 

^ color optional 


iOO% Burn-In 
and Testing. 

Al! systems undergo a 48 hour 
configuration, testing and bum- 
in period. We configure system 
boards, set DIP swrtches, 
format hard drives, perform 
memory diagnostics and check 
system with monitor 




ISM PC', At'*'. PC/XT'^ are tradentarhs and IBM* is a registered trademark of Intemationat Business Machines Corporation. 


I 

i 






I 






LOGICSOFT ALSO OFFERS 
SOFTWARE FOR VIRTUALLY 
EVERTIBM PC APPLICATION... 


WORD PROCESSING 
DISPLAY WRITE III . . . .$369 

Easy Writer II 195 

MICROSOFT WORD 3 . . 269 

Multimate 239 

MULTIMATE 

ADVANTAGE 295 

OffIceWriter 239 

Pfs: Write 85 

Samnalll 279 

VOLKSWRITER3 145 

WORDPERFECT 199 

Wordstar 169 

Wordstar Pro Pak 239 

WORDSTAR 2000 249 

Wordstar 2000 Plus .... 295 

XY WRITE III 219 

WORD PROCESSING 
ADD-ONS 

Fancy Font $145 

Punctuation & Style ... 75 

TURBO LIGHTNING ... 59 

Word Finder 59 

DATABASE MANAGEMENT 

Cornerstone $ 85 

d BASE III PLUS 429 

Knowledge Man 2 275 

Paradox 495 

Pfs: File 85 

Pfs: Report 79 

Powerbase 209 

R:BASE5000 329 

Revelation 495 


REFLEX 59 

Think Tank 109 

Q&A 215 

DATA BASE MGMT ADD-ONS 

Clipper (DBase) $359 

Clout 2 (R: Base) 129 

DB (It Compiler (Wordtech) 

459 

Ext. Report Writer 

(R:Base) 99 

Quickcode ill (0 Base) . . 149 
Quickreport (D Base) ... 149 
SPREADSHEETS/ 
INTEGRATED 

Ability $ 65 

Enable 339 

FRAMEWORK II 419 

Javelin 459 

LOTUS 1-2-3 315 


Quickcode for 1-2-3 ... . 85 

GRAPHICS 

CHARTMASTER $209 

Diagram Master 189 

Energraphics(NEV^ ... 295 

Gem Draw 159 

Graph Writer 219 

Harvard Presentation . . 249 

Map Master 229 

MICROSOFT CHART . 179 

Pfs: Graph 85 

Sign Master 149 

CAD/CAM 

AutoCAD . . . Low Price Call! 

Pro Design II 229 

PLOTTERS AVAIL 
See hardware listings 


PROJECT MANAGEMENT 

Harvard Total $279 

Microsoft Project 229 

SUPER PROJECT PLUS 259 

Timeline 239 

FINANCIAL 
MANAGING YOUR 

MONEY $109 

Dollars N' Sense 109 

ACCOUNTING 

BPI Entry from $319 

COMPUTER ASSOCIATES 

(Formerly I US) from 319 

SPECIAL! 

Buy Any (3) CA Accounting 
Modules 6 get 
Easy Plus FREE! 

Great Plains from 449 

Open Systems from 319 


Multiplan 

Supercalc III 

SYMPHONY 

119 

195 

439 

CCOMPILER(MS) 

Cobol Compiler (MS) . . . 
Fortran Compiler (MS). . 

$239 

429 

219 

State of the Art Mas . 
TCS Client Write Up. 
Real World 

from 579 
... 895 
from 529 

SPREADSHEET ADD-ONS 

Lattice C Compiler 

259 

MISaUTILITIES 

LOTUS REPORT 


MACRO ASSEMBLER 


COPY II PC 

... $ 35 

WRITER 

$109 

(MS) 

95 

Crosstalk XVi 

. . . 99 

Cambridge Spreadsheet 


Pascal Compiler (MS) .. 

185 

FAST BACK 

. . . 99 

Analyst 

75 

Quick Basic (MS) 

69 

Microsoft Windows 

... 65 

Sideways 

45 

True Basic 

119 

NORTON UTILITIES 

. . . 55 

Spreadsheet Auditor . . . 

99 

TURBO PASCAL 

45 

Prokey 4.0 

. . . 79 




Remote 

. . . 99 





Resident 

. . . 75 

OVER 200 OTHER SOFTWARE TITLES IN STOCK 


SIDEKICK 

. . . 49 

AT LOW DISCOUNT PRICES. 


Superkey 

... 45 


#1 Rated productivity software. 



dBase III Plus $429 


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CIRCLE 491 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



V I K W 1» 0 I N T S 

■ PETER NORTON 


Kitchen-table 

ENTREPRENEURS 
REVISITED 

Two years ago, Norton analyzed the businesses of some of his colleagues and predicted their 
prospects for success. Now he tells what happened to them. 



T he most popular series of columns 
I’ve ever done was the one devoted 
to the subject of “kitchen table” 
software entrepreneurs. The last column in 
that series (“Lessons from Software Vet- 
erans,” PC Magazine, Volume 3 Number 
13), published 2 years ago, told the tale of 
five of my colleagues in the software busi- 
ness. I analyzed what was smart and dumb 
(in my opinion) about what they were do- 
ing and guessed at the prospects for their 
continued success. It’s time now for us to 
see what has happened to the people I 
code-named Ms. Smirk, the Boxer, the 
Generals, Mr. Easy, and Dutch Treat. 
(Now, as before. I’m disguising the play- 
ers a little, but the key events that I’ve de- 
scribed are real.) 

FORTUNE SMILES Two years ago, I 
repotted that Ms. Smirk was doing very 
well in the software game, even though I 
felt she had made some serious mistakes: 
she’d failed to branch out from her single- 
product, and she’d passed up some oppor- 
tunities to raise her prices (and profits) 
when it would have been easy to do so. 
Then, there was the question of how long 
her monopoly would last. 

The years have been kind to Ms. Smirk. 
Her sales kept growing, faster than her 
grandest dreams. Competitors have ap- 
peared, but not one has put a dent in her 
sales: a clever — and impossible to dupli- 
cate — sales strategy has defended her 
product. (One of the software giants tried 
to imitate her special sales strategy but got 
nowhere.) So far, so good. Now Ms. 
Smirk is trying to break out of the one- 


product mold. New software may make 
her richer (her business sounder and her 
fortune safer), or it may piddle away the 
success she’s had. For most of the group, 
the last 2 years have seen a clear rise or fall; 
for Ms. Smirk, the last 2 years have been a 
spectacular success, but she’s beginning a 
risky new chapter of her tale . 

A BIG FISH IN A SMALL POND Allof 
these software entrepreneurs tried to suc- 
ceed by having a product “big” enough to 
make some money but small enough to 
elude the attention of the major software 
players (companies like Microsoft, Ash- 
ton-Tate and Lotus). The Boxer followed 
this plan to perfection, with programs un- 
likely to attract competition. The Boxer’s 
ad campaign was just right (not so expen- 
sive as to throw profits away but not so 
small as to miss attracting his customers). 
He also had several software programs to 
offer, which makes his business much saf- 



er than my one-product examples. 

My admiration for the Boxer continues; 

2 years have shown the wisdom of his 
ways. He avoided a real pitfall: getting rich 
and then going broke. Now he has more 
software (and hardware to go with it) and, 
as near as I can tell, his story perfectly ex- 
emplifies what a kitchen-table software 
entrepreneur should do; and he’s a perfect 
Southern gentleman to boot. His is a tale 
that appears to end happily ever after. 

TRAMPLED BY THE ELEPHANT 

Two years ago, the Generals seemed the 
best of my group. They had one highly 
successful software product that was the 
accepted leader of its type, and they had 
pretty well buffaloed their competition. 
They had a sound business strategy for 
their product (price it high so that the prof- 
its would pay for an expensive four-color 
ad campaign to increase sales and put a 
high-cost barrier in front of any potential 
competitors). They also had a sensible 
plan to expand their product line, build up 
their company, sell it, and live happily 
ever after on the profits. 

However, it didn’t work out that way. 

For one thing, the other products never 
materialized. For another, a new software 
entrepreneur (I’ll call him Rogue Ele- 
phant) appeared from out of nowhere (or 
some place like Quebec) and changed the 
rules of the game, trampling the Generals g 
along the way. The Elephant, having had | 
great success selling other kinds of soft- | 
ware, seems to have also taken the Gener- | 
als’ specialty from them. My guess is that | 
they’re down for the count— the victims I 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
103 


V I 1-, W l> () I N T S 


■ PETER NORTON 


both of their own errors (staying a one- 
product company too long and not banking 
their profits) and of the Elephant’s unex- 
pected success. Generally, once you're ac- 
cepted as the leader in one type of software 


(as the Generals were), you’re in a rela- 
tively secure position; but that wasn’t true 
in this case. We’ll see in a year whether 
I’m right in thinking that their enterprise is 
terminally ill. 


A SLOW DEATH Mr. Easy was having 
it rough the last time we saw him. His pro- 
grams didn’t have broad enough appeal, 
and he wasn’t teaching his potential cus- 
tomers with the small, but (for him) expen- 
sive, display ads he was using. Two years 
ago, he appeared to have found his salva- 
tion in the discovery that he and his cus- 
tomers could best find each other through 
ads and listings in program catalogs rather 
than in magazines such as PC Magazine. 

But that didn’t seem to work out. Mr. 
Easy has disappeared from sight, his soft- 
ware business, as far as I know, out of 
business. In the early days of the PC, there 
were hundreds like him, who had hope but 
no success. Mr. Easy lasted longer than 
many, which is why I’d found his example 
worth including in my group. It turned out, 
though, that he just took a little longer to 
die than most. Mr. Easy started out like 
Ms. Smirk, with a very low-budget, kitch- 
en-table operation. Fortune smiled on her, 
but not him. The lesson there is that the 
game is worth playing, but don’t bet your 
life savings on it. For every Smirk who 
wins, there’re dozens of Easys who don’t. 

WEIRD AND WONDERFUL PROD- 
UCTS On the whole . my original predic- 
tions about this group of software vendors 
turned out to be as accurate as such predic- 
tions can be. But my predictions about the 
last of my original group, a wild man I 
code-named Dutch Treat, were the least 
accurate. (There’s now a PC software 
company with the name Dutch Treat, but, 
of course. I’m not referring to it here.) 
Back then, I criticized Treat for being con- 
fused about whether he was in the hard- 
ware or software business and for blowing 
far too much money on flashy advertising. 
At the time. Treat seemed to be headed for 
disaster. 

But things turned out quite differently. 
Wild-man Treat is truly as chaotic a busi- 
nessman as 1 thought he was (and 1 know 
he’d agree with me), but his talents are so 
exotic and his products (still a mix of hard- 
ware and software) are so weird and won- 
derful that he continues to have a strong 
following. The bizarre nature of his prod- 
ucts has proven to be his key strength, and 
not the weakness that 1 narrow-mindedly 
thought. In my mind, the PC market was 
all about Chevys, Hondas, and Porsches. 


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CIRCLE 490 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




V I h w i» () I N r s 



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■ PETER NORTON 


Treat found that there’s a real market for 
hot-rod supplies, drag racing, and demoli- 
tion derbies. Although Treat isn’t in the PC 
mainstream (or in the big-time profits), his 
business is very robust and doing far better 
than 1 predicted. 

NEW PLAYERS A few new folks in the 
small software game deserve to be added 
to my original gang of five. I’ve already 
mentioned the Rogue Elephant, in the 2 
years since this series of columns began, 
the Elephant has gone from nowhere to be- 
ing a major player in the software game, 
completely out of the league of the folks 
I’m discussing here. 

The String Bean was one of the very 
first people to board the PC software band- 
wagon. Bean tried a totally different tactic 
than the rest of my group. Although Bean, 
like the others, began as a one-man opera- 
tion, he went after a major-league market, 
with a major application, something like 
databases or word processors. Needless to 
say, the big guys have been running rough- 
shod over Bean’s operation, and he’s not 
making as much money as he should, al- 
though his gross revenues are higher than 
anyone else’s in the group. And he is hav- 
ing a lot of fun and gening a lot of glory, at 
least. Bean is a good example of the point 
that small software entrepreneurs should 
be hunting small game; better to bag an an- 
telope than get gored trying to bag a rhi- 
noceros. 

in contrast, perhaps the most glorious 
example of my sample of small software 
businesses is Zipper, who tried selling 
software the user-supported, “shareware” 
way. There are about a half-dozen folks 
that 1 know of having a go at this scheme; 
all are doing OK, some are doing well, but 
Zipper hit the big time. 

Of all the small-company software en- 
trepreneurs companies that I’ve studied. 
Zipper would probably make the best busi- 
ness-school case study because he did ev- 
erything right. He knew how to reap all the 
benefits of smallness but used sound, pro- 
fessional judgment about how to run a 
business. In particular, he avoided wasting 
money by not chasing glory: he didn’t try 
to grow too big or too fast, 

in a year or two, I’ll take another look at 
these software veterans and let you know 
how they’re doing. 119 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 
106 


19 8 6 




your PC 
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QNX vs UNIX 





lA Qei^TlIOM OF j;RCHITggTURE 


What do QNX and UNIX have to do with 
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The design determines the environment in which you 
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QNX’s superb performance and compaa size is the result of 
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dedicated file servers and you can attach terminals (users) 
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Everyone is talking about Unix like systems, but no one 
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1 960's and into the 70's. QNX however, was designed in 


the 80's and will be a driving force of the I990's. Over 
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Quantum strongly believes that there are good reasons for 
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VIEWPOINTS 

■ JIM SEYMOUR 


A BETTER mY 
TO SUPPORT 
SOFTWARE 



An enterprising new company is proving the viability of third-party software support. If the 
idea catches on, customers could face a whole difterentform of software support. 


A few columns ago (Volume 5 Num- 
ber 3), I mused about the inevita- 
ble rise of third-party software- 
support vendors and the bright prospects 1 
see for those firms. 

Debbie Fain, who ran one of the indus- 
try’s best telephone-support operations for 
Samna, went out on her own recently and, 
as MSR Inc., is proving just how viable 
third-party-support businesses can be. 

My column talked about the most fun- 
damental level of third-party support: tak- 
ing over responsibility for supporting a 
software publisher's customers directly, so 
that buyers of, szy.XyCalc would actually 
be calling the third-party vendor (let’s call 
them 3PVs) when they think they’re call- 
ing XyCalc's offices for help. 

That’s still a promising market, but 
Fain’s crew, now numbering about 25, has 
found selling support directly to PC users 
an easier entry point. 

MSR began by cultivating the corporate 
market and has scored some big clients: 
General Motors, for example, for which 
MSR supports about 5(X) rc users in the 
Southeast. 

Retail support Now the compa- 
ny’s also going after the onesie-twosie 
sales at the retail level through a deal with 
distributor Softsel. Soon you’ll be able to 
buy from your comer computer store a 
cutesy little MSR box, styled to look like a 
box of floppy disks, that entitles you to 20 
questions about any one product MSR sup- 
ports, answered through MSR’s “8(X)” 
phone lines. 

The tab? Just $100 to $125 per pro- 


gram, or $3(X) for all the packages MSR 
supports. You’ll also get MSR’s Cheat- 
sheet booklet for the products you specify. 
I'm less than happy that MSR has tried to 
trademark that wonderfully useful term, 
which so many have used for so long to de- 
scribe all sorts of little memory-boosters. 
But 1 like the booklets themselves very 
much. 

The list of PC programs currently sup- 
ported by the company is interesting, but 
hardly comprehensive: MS-EXJS, Word- 
Star 2000, Mult'iMate, Samna, Enable, 
Crosstalk, WordPerfect, DisplavWrite 111, 
dBASElU, R:baseSeries5000,'l-2-3, and 
Symphony, Fain says more titles will be 
added as demanded by customers. 

VENDOR SUPPORT PROBLEMS 

Why pay a hundred bucks or more when 
vendors offer the same service for free, via 
their own “8(X)" lines? 

First, some products simply aren’t sup- 


ported by their publishers. Have you ever 
tried to get IBM to answer a question about 
DisplayWrite? When you’re sitting there 
wondering how IBM’s fragmentary in- 
structions in two of the world’s more ob- 
scure and ill-organized manuals jibe with 
the nonresults you’re getting, as you try to 
mail-merge with a datafile from dBASE, 
what do you do? 

You call MSR, if you had the foresight 
to buy one of its little boxes, or if your em- 
ployer chose to sign up for company wide 
support. 

Even with those products that do re- 
ceive phone support from their publishers, 
the frequent busy signals, long holds, call- 
backs that take days, and poorly trained 
staff — or even well-trained staff who 
aren’t cross-trained to understand how 
their products work within the broader PC 
software universe — ^get tiring. 

Wouldn’t you pay five bucks a pop for a 
fast, authoritative answer? From people 
who know their company lives or dies not 
by its software revenues but on how happy 
customers are with their answers? 

HITTING CURVE BALLS Still, I’m a 
skeptical sort. I visited MSR’s telephone 
boiler room in Atlanta recently and threw 
its support staff some curves on imaginary 
problems. I got good answers. 

Part of the secret is that MSR invested 
in an IBM System 36 minicomputer and s 
has developed a decision-tree software | 
system loaded with common and uncom- | 
mon questions and answers for the prod- | 
ucts they support. (Indeed, getting these I 
decision trees built and into the system for i 



PC MAGAZtNE ■ AUGUST 1986 
113 




\ I I. U POINTS 


■ JIM SEYMOUR 


new products is MSR's primary restraint in 
adding support for additional programs. ) 

What 1 liked best about the answers I 
got. from a kind and intelligent woman 
named Charlotte Hixson, was that they fre- 


quently went beyond those literal, insular, 
right-out-of-the-book responses you often 
get from software shops. 

In a DisplayWrhe problem involving 
page breaks, the real answer had nothing to 


ATTENTION 


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ginating. We got there quickly. 

In a /-2-J problem about a missing 
WKS file, after I described how the boss 
had come in and worked on my PC last 
night. Charlotte asked me to make certain 


■ What I liked best about 
the answers I got from 
MSR was that frequently 
they went beyond those 
insular, right-out-of-the- 
book responses you often 
get from software shops. 


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he hadn't changed the default directory. 
He had, in my hypothetical situation, and 
once we discovered that change by /FD- 
ing, then changed back to my customary 
directory, there was the imaginary file. 

You don’t get that kind of analysis 
down at ComputerLand. Nor. often, on 
the phone with software firms' support 
centers. 

COMPETITION MSR is certain to 
have serious competition soon. The mar- 
ket’s just too large and too rich to leave to 
one or two or five firms. 

And if those new 3PVs get good 
enough and cheap enough soon enough, 
software firms are going to face a very in- 
teresting dilemma: should they begin rec- 
ommending 3PVs to their customers'.’ 
Should they sever and .separately price af- 
ter-sale support to provide an incentive to 
lead customers to the 3PVs? 

Or will software firms continue to em- 
brace the two rales that seem paradoxically 
to lie at the heart of an innovation-driven 
business: "We've never done it that 
way,” and “Why should we change'.’ 
We're making money!” 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
114 




Determination 


Identifying The Need 

Frogressive Micro Distributors is foundsd on 
the belief that many purchasers want a single, 
dependable source to buy their Personal 
Computer equipment from. We provide this by 
offering you an innovative mix of competitive 
prices on state-of-the-art products, and 
helpful services like good technical advice and 
quick equipment repairs. We have helped 
thousands of PC buyers get in touch with the 
best in PC products and services, and we 
continue to believe that if you are buying PC 
hardware and software, getting acquainted 
with us at PMD will save you both time and 
money. 



Quality Products That 
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We offer products from the best and most 
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Personal Support 

Once you've made the Investment, getting 
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difference. For years, our technicians have 
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Because each user has a different set of 
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behind each sale, from system installation to 
helpful information and advice. 

Prompt Delivery 

Our warehouse is stocked with the most 
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the manufacturer within 24 hours. 



The operative concept at Progressive Micro 
Distributors is that of quality - both in prod- 
ucts and in service- combined with 
reasonable prices. We've listened to our 
customer’s needs, and have found the way to 
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CIRCLE 309 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




Ibelaigest selling 
1200bps modem 
justgot smallet: 



ThenewHawes 

ShiartnKK3emi20CB' 

Now you can get a lot more out of 
your PC, by putting a little more in. 
CXir new Hayes Smartmodem 1200B 
includes the same quality and 
advanced features that have made 
it the leading 1200 bps modem. 
Now, advances in Hayes technology 
allow us to make it available in a 
size that fits either full slots or a 
"single" half slot. 

That's important news if you have 
an IBM,* AT&.T,* Compaq,® Tandy* 
or other compatible computer with 
half slots. It means with a Smart- 
modem 1200B, you can free up one 
of your full slots for an additional 
function, such as color graphics. 


more memory or networking. Or, if 
you prefer, you can continue to use 
the new Smartmodem 1200B in one 
of the full slots. Hayes makes it easy 
and versatile to fit your needs. 

There are many good reasons for 
choosing Hayes. Our new space- 
saving Smartmodem 1200B is one of 
them. Hayes Smartcom H,* the 
industry's best selling communica- 
tions software, is another. 

Smartcom D for the IBM and 
compatibles makes short work of 

CIRCLE 165 ON READER SERVICE CARD 

Holes' 

Say yes to the future 


communicating, while allowing 
you to take full advantage of the 
sophisticated capabilities of your 
Smartmodem liOOB. Together, they 
create a powerful, yet easy-to-use, 
communications ^tem for your 
PC. They're made lai each other, 
and customized for IBM PC s. 

The best reasons of all for choos- 
ing Hayes are the "built-m" benefits. 
Advanced technology. Unsurpassed 
reliabihty. And a customer service 
organization that's second to none. 

So, when you see your authorized 
Hayes dealer ask for the largest sell- 
ing 1200 bps modem. Smartmodem 
1200B. And remember. Now it's 
smaller, too. Hayes Microcomputer 
Products, Inc. P.O. Box 105203, Atlanta, 
GA30348. (404) 441-1617. 





REAEWONLY 

A review of the IBM Personal Computer Family. Vol. 3, No. 1 


Welcome To Read Only. 

Heres news for IBM rc users. 
IBM has expanded its already 
expansive PC product line to bring 
even more power and flexibility to 
your desktop. 

In this issue alone you^ll be reading 
about new enhancements to the 
IBM PC/XT, the IBM Personal 
Computer AT.* the IBM PC Keyboard, 
the IBM Proprinter, the Mainframe 
Communications Assistant, and 
more. 

And, as if that weren’t enough, 

IBM has also found time to expand 
your eomputing horizons even 
more by introducing exciting new 
I*C products. This issue of Read Only 
will tell you about the new IBM PC 

Two Ctrl a 
keys for at 
Irnus acce 


Convertible, new 3.5" diskettes, the 
new IBM PC 3.5" External Diskette 
Drive, and two new accounting 
software packages. 



HARDWARE NEWS 


'Fhe Right Touch. 

To make it easier than ever to work 
at an IBM PC/XT or Personal 
Computer AT, IBM has introduced 
the new IBM Enhanced Personal 
Computer Keyboard (shown below). 

Alt 

idex- 

Twelvc Function 


IBM redesigned its classic 
keyboard to better meet the needs 
of PC users, office system users, as 
well as users who communicate with 
larger computers. 

To accomplish this, IBM included 
separate cursor and screen control 
keys, making it easier for users to 
dedicate the numeric keypad to 
numeric input when working with 
number-intense applications. Plus, 
the keypad can still be used fur 
cursor and screen control when not 
in the num/lock mode. 

IBM also increased the number 
of function keys from ten to twelve, 
arranged across the top of the 
keyboard. This gives users two 
additional keys for increased 
automatic operation. 

/VII to enhance the productivity of 
those who work with words, numbers 
or a host of other applications. 



Isolated Escape key 
tn help reduce 
ke>'ing errors. 


Knlarged Tab and 
Caps lAfck keys. 


keys in new position- 
two additional 
Function key's pn>- 
vide added flexibility 
in host access or 
c«)mmunications 
applications. 


Rnlarged liackspace 
I and Shift keys. 


Dedicated Function 
Control keys for 
frequently used 
functions. 


Dedicated Numeric 
Pad including Enter 
key and four 
Arithmetic Function 
for easy 
numeric input 

Separate Screen 
Control and 
Cursor keys for 
faster, easier access. 


The IBM Enhanced PC Keyboard 
to help you be more productive, faster. 


Small Wonder. 


Proof positive that good things 
come in small packages is the 
new 3.5-inch diskette. 

And thafs big news for anyone 
who uses an appropriately con- 
figured IBM PC, PC/XT, Personal 
Computer AT and the new IBM 
PC Convertible. 

Durable 3.5" diskettes, allow 
you to carry over 350 standard 
typed pages (720KB) in your shirt 
pocket. That s twice as much 
information as on a 5.25" (360KB) 
diskette, in a much more rugged, 
portable form. 




The npi«' 3.5" tiiskette stores up to twice 
as much (720 KB) as a 5.25" (360KB) 
diskette. 


Now I BM PC users have the option 
of using programs and data in either 
size, and the flexibility to work with 
other members of the IBM PC family 
using 3.5" diskettes. 


IVanslation Services. 


{ 




The new IBM Personal Computer 
3.5" External Diskette Drive provides 
a vital bridge between your IBM PC 
and 3.5" technology. This compact 
unit makes it easy for you to share 
. information between 

" computers using 3.5" 
diskettes and 

5.25" diskettes. 


T/ie IBM l>C 3.5" 

External Diskette Drive • . 
prwide.s a cost-effective bridge 
between 3.5" and 5.25" technology. 


The new IBM PC Convertible isaj 


The IBM Personal Computer 3.5" 
External Diskette Drive comes in 
two models, one for the IBM Personal 
Computer AT and one for the IBM 
PC, PC/XT or IBM PC Convertible. 

Information and applications can 
be shared* between 3.5" diskette 
drive machines and an IBM PC 
running DOS 3.2 with the IBM 
Personal Computer 3.5" External 
Diskette Drive attached. 

Transferring flies and programs 
between 3.5" and 5.25" diskettes is as 
easy as making a backup copy of a 
diskette. So, you can very quickly have 
a “database to go” for your IBM PC 
Convertible. Or, a week’s worth of 
sales call information in a ready-to-use 
form for your secretary when you 
return. 


Print Evolution. 


The new IBM Proprinter XL is 
especially designed to make life easier 
for those who work with accounting 
applications. Its wide carriage design 
and switchable printing speeds of up 
to 200cps are perfeedy suited for 
spreadsheet applications. 

The IBM Proprinter XL also 
features an easy-to-use front operator 
panel that lets you choose from the 
XL’s extensive menu of features, even 
if you have little or no programming 
skills. 

Plus, the new Proprinter XL offers 
a long list of standard, labor-saving 
features to make many printing 
jobs easier easy printing of 
single sheets and envelopes 
) without removing your 

continuous forms paper, 
power-assisted paper 


loading, all-points-addressable graph- 
ics capabilities, near-letter-quality 
printing (40cps), and emphasized text 
printing (lOOeps). Plus, you can set 
the printer in double high, double 
wide or emphasized print through the 
operator panel or through software. 


Power To Go. 


The new IBM PC Convertible can 
play two powerful roles in any business- 
person’s life. 

In the office, with an optional 
IBM PC monochrome or color display 
and adapter, the PC Convertible 
Alls the bill as a space-saving 
desktop PC. 

But when you’re ready to hit the 
road or runway, just attach the high 
quality, 80-column x 25-line detach- 
able LCD display, and the PC 
Convertible is ready to travel, too. 

Weighing in at a scant 12 pounds, 
the IBM PC Convertible delivers 
full-size PC performance in a portable 
computer with heavyweight features 
including; 

A full-function keyboard with full- 
size keys and the same center-to- 
center key spacing as a standard IBM 
PC keyboard. 

A fast, very efficient 80C88 micro- 
processor with up to 10 hours of 
non-stop computing power between 
battery recharges (with average use). 

Up to 512KB of user storage 
(through 128KB expansion cards 
from a standard 256KB). 

Dual 3.5" diskette drives supporting 
720KB capacity 3.5" diskettes. 

Additional IBM PC Convertible 
features help ensure that work done 
on the road doesn’t get lost in transit. 





►MVT PC that ivorks whem^r you <{o. 



These optional features include: 

An internal modem feature to let 
you communicate with other 
computers simply by plugg;ing the 
PC Convertible into any standard 
modular phone outlet. 

The IBM Convertible Printer for 
system battery powered, near-letter- 
quality printing anywhere. 

Plus, the IBM PC Convertible can 
come with a helpful set of programs 
to get you up and running on the 
road to enhanced productivity. Fast. 

I^lanned For Growth. 

It s a classic case of a very good 
thing that just keeps getting better. 

IBM has now introduced the 
enhanced PC/XT product family: 
increased flexibility in storages, 
memory and option configuration for 
maximum productivity today, and 



The neic IBM PC/XT— enhanced poiver 
and flexibility for today. And tomorrow. 


plenty of room to expand as your 
business does. 

The XT is now availal)le with a 20- 
megabyte hard file that can store up 
to 10,000 pages of information. 
Theres also an easy, low cost way to 
increase memory to a full 640KB on 
the system board without tying up 
valuable expansion slot.<<. And the 
XT now has 3.5" diskellt* capability, 
utilizing the new IBM Personal 
Computer 3.5" Kxtemal Diskette Drive. 

Plus, full IBM PC rompatibilily 
means that no matter which XT model 
you choose, you can hemTit from 
the extensive IBM Personal Computer 
software library. 

The new IBM PC/X'l's, because 
one size should not have to fit all. 

Power Play. 

If you thought you'd seen all the 
IBM Personal Computer AT has to 
offer, think again. Tw ice. 

IBM has increased pro<‘essor speed 
in two new models of the IBM 
Personal Computer VT by an impres- 
sive 33% (from hmli/ to 8mhz). So, 
they’rt* sure to become your fast 
friends if you work w ith large spread- 
sheets and volumes of data. 

The new' mmiels offer u standard 

3()MB hard file and the option to add 
an additional 20MB or 30MB hard 
file. That s a grand total of 60MB, 
or approximately 30,000 pages of 
words and numbers. 

These two newcomers are horn 
communicators: Sharing files with 
other PC s from a variety of popular 
software programs. V^orking as a 
server for data storage and file 
processing in an lEfM PC LAN running 



the IBM PC Local Area Network 
program. Utilizing IBM TopView™ 
and one of the IBM PC 3270 Kmula- 
tion Programs to access mainframe 
information and to execute PC 
DOS and mainframe applications 
concurrently. 

And the best news of all is that 
you can get all this increased 
power without an 



20MB 30MB 

Now the IBM Personal Computer AT 
offers a choice of hard fdes to meet 
your storage needs. 



WHyvrs I'UE I’ro(;ram 


Meet Your New Assistant. 

Keeping the books for a small 
business is a very big job. So, IBM 
thought you eould use a friendly, 
versatile, highly skilled assistant. 
The new IBM Aeeounting Assistant 
Series. 

This complete series of automated 
bookkeeping appll<‘ation programs 
for small to medium size l>usiness<-s 
ean help cut any job down to size. 
And, its modular design means that 
you ean start out with just the pro- 
grams you need today, then expand 
your serie*s as your business grows. 

The IBM Aeeounting Assistant 
Series includes six individual 
editions: General Accounting, 
Accounts I’ayahle. Accounts Beceiv- 
able and Billing, Payroll, Inventory 






The IHM Accountinf! Assistant Series. 
Hig help for small to medium size 
businesses. 


Control and Purchasing, and Job Cost 
l>idding software. 

Plus, thanks to the IBM Accounting 
Assistant Series’ user-friendly attri- 
butes and easy-to-follow instructions, 
you can start profiting from your 
system from day one. 

Hif;h-Powero(I Advice. 

Perhaps your business has pro- 
gressed past the need for basic 
accounting software. Then you 
should consider getting powerful, 
sophisti(‘ated help: the IBM 
Business Advisor. 

IBM Business Advisor l*C account- 
ing software takes integrated software 
to a new level of sophistication and 
ease-of-use. 

Business Advisors seamless 
architecture^ allows functions from 
each of its modules to play together. 
Passage back and forth among the 
General Ac'counting, Accounts 
Payable, Accounts Receivable, Payroll, 
Inventory Control, Order Entry and 
other applications is intuitive. 

Menus guide you easily from one task 
to another. 

And when you make a change 
anywhere, consider it made every- 
where it applies. Automatically, 
through Business Advisors real-time 
|>osting feature. 

This Business Advisor speaks your 
language, too. It uses business language* 
instead of accounting language, 
and has over 80 easily c-ustomized 
financial report formats built in. 
And you don't have to keep this all 
to yourself, because in an IBM L/\N 


different people at different PC s 
can work on the same file at the 
same time. 

And you always go further when 
everyone is working together. 


NEWS” BRIEFS 


ErnuUttion Programs., 
Entry Level, Version 2 and Version 3, 
give you an easy and inexpensive 
way to attach your IBM PC to your 
host computer. 

Working at your IBM PC, stand- 
alone or in an IBM LAN, you can 
now utilize the local power and user- 
friendly attributes of your PC for 
DOS applications, plus have access 
to the vast memory, numbei-crunching 
capacities and other productivity- 
enhancing capabilities of your host 
computer 

The Entry Level product offers up 
to -W/i) faster file transfer between your 



IBM TCii270 Emulation 

Ih-odurts van put yrrur IBM /*C or IBM 

LAN in touvh with the hig time. 


PC and host computer. A “Hot Key” 
for easy switching between host and 
IX^ applications. Keyboard remapping 
so you can always work in a familiar 
keyboard format. And much more. 

Versions 2 and 3 can provide an 
economical gateway which lets you 



share the wealth of host knowledge 
with the members of your IBM PC 
Network or Token-Ring Network. 

Versions 2 and 3 support the new 
K DOS 3.2, 3.5" media, the IBM 
Local Area Network program 1.10, 
a host of printers and the TopView 
1.1 interface, for multitasking and 
windowing capabilities. 

All of which adds up to added 
productivity for you and everyone 
on your IBM Local Area Network 
or token ring. 

To find out more about the entire 
family of 3270 PC Emulation 
Programs, as well as a wide range of 
other IBM connectivity hardware 
and software, watch for the next 
Read Only. 

Mainframe Communirations 
Assistant enhancements include 
3.5" media support and increased 
IBM PC family communications 
capabilities. 

The IBM PC Vttice Communica- 
tions Option speaks for itself. This 
multifunction adapter card can 
allow your IBM PC to recognize and 
respond to voice commands, speak 
text that appears on the screen, 
initiate and receive/record/playback 
phone calls, provide remote, tone 
push button phone access to your PC 
(and host), and transmit voice and 
data simultaneously. — ^ — ■* 


hbr moft' information on any of the 
IVivonal (^oiiipuU'r protlucki din- 
('USH«‘d in this isKUC of Head Only, see 
vour Aulhori/ed IBM Personal Com- 
puti-r Dealer. Or, rail 8(K)-447-4700. 
In Alaska rail 8(H)- 147-0890. 


IBM and Personal Computer XT are regulered 
trademarks of International Business Machines 
Corporation. PC/XT and l<>pV»ew are trademarks 
of International Business Machines Corporation. 

*Before copying any software pntduct, be sure to 
n-ad, understand and comply with the specific 
software license agreement and installation 
instructions for that produc-t. 

C I9B6 Inlemational Business Machines Corp«»ralion. 
Uttle Tramp ehararler licensed by Bubbles Inc.. S.A. 



Orchid’s 'RirboEGA" 

The world’s fastest EGA 





MDA 


TT ID nn rr, a 


HGC 


CGA 


TurboEGA 


6RAPtflCS BOARD SALES 


EGA 


Introducing the only Enhanced Graphics Adapter 
with PCturbo" speed. 


The exjjerts agree: the EGA is the 
breathtaking new graphics standard, 
but the sophisticated software written 
for it places a big burden on the PC's 
processing speed. Beautiful graphics, 
crisp text, but too slow. 

Everyone else rushed their EGAs to 
the market, but Orchid Technology 
took the time to do it right. Orchid's 
TurboEGA™, from the inventors of PC 
TurboProcessing, packs a high-speed 
Turbo and an EGA into one slot, for 
the world's fastest EGA. 

Graphics with Speed 

TurboEGA makes IBM PCs and 
XTs run faster than an AT. It brings 
dazzling speed to sluggish graphics 
programs. Alt types of software run 
faster, so you finish more quickly. 
Transparent to the user, you won't 
know it's there until you see its speed. 


We are so confident that our TurboEGA 
is the ultimate graphics card that we 
decided to give away a free copy 
of Microsoft's Windows” with each 
TurboEGA*. Even Microsoft 
recommends that you run Windows 
on an AT. Now Orchid's TurboEGA 
gives you AT speed so XT users can 
use tfds number one windowing 
software at the speed they demand. 

The Complete Solution 

Only Orchid puts this much 
performance into one slot and comes 
fully loaded with 256K of RAM, so 
there's no hidden cost. TurboEGA 
is the complete graphics solution. 

Pick up the phone and find out 
how you can have the EGA the 
competition wishes they had: Orchid's 
TurboEGA, the world's fastest. 

If you have an AT or a system with 80286 speed, 
ask about the Orchid EGA” — four graphic- 
card compatibility in one slot. 


TuiboECA, Orchid EGA, and PCturbo and trademarks of Orchid Technology. Microeoh Windows is a trademark of the 
Mkroaoft Corporation. All other product names are trademarks of their manufacturers. CCA screen by PC Paint Plus. 

CIRCLE 177 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


Features: 

• Powered by 7.2MHz 80286 

• Optional 5 or 8MHz 80287 

• 256K of on-board RAM 

• Four graphics modes: EGA, 
CGA, MDA, Hercules 

• Supports the long list of 
EGA software: 

Microsoft Windows & 
Word 

Lotus 1-2-3 & Symphony 
Topview 
Framework 
Chart-Master 
AutoCAD 
PC Paint Plus 
and more... 



47790 Westinghouse Dr. 
Fremont, CA 94536 
415/490-8586 
TU: 709289 


ORCHID 


The Innovative Leaders 


•Offer good only on TurboEGA 
purchases until July 31, 1986. Please 
allow two weeks for delivery. 







Corporate Maneuver. 


In the high-pressure corporate environment, 
every move counts. It’s no wonder, then, that 
many corporate PC users are reaching for 
WordPerfect for powerful business word processing. 
Reaching the top. 

WordPerfect is now the best-selling word 
processor for the IBM PC, according to market 
research firm InfoCorp. And customers like 
Ford, Chrysler and TRW are leading the way. 
Meeting user needs. 

But WordPerfect’s climb to the top was no 
overnight success story. For the past three 
years, user feedback has been applied to each 
new version of WordPerfect, pushing it closer 
and closer to perfection. 


The result is WordPerfect 4.1, a word processor 
with unsurpassed business features for the IBM 
PC and compatibles. Features like an elegant 
thesaurus, a 115,000-word spelling dictionary, 
math capabilities, columns displayed side-by- 
side on screen, windows, line drawing, para- 
graph numbering, and extensive printer support. 
Make your move. 

There is a word processor that is as productive 
for executives as it is for secretaries. WordPerfect 
4.1. It’s the consummate corporate maneuver. 
For more information, call or write WordPerfect 
Corp., 288 West Center St., Orem, Utah 84057, 

,*01, 227.4000 ^J^j^rfect 

CORPORATION 

CIRCLE 513 ON READER SERVICE CARD 






Reason 1: More Memory 

When you need more memory, the Abovefunction Card' from American Computer & Peripheral, Inc. delivers a full 2 
Megabytes of RAM to your American, IBM* personal computers and compatibles. 

The American Abovefunction Card can fill conventional memory to 640K with the remaining as expanded memory 
or instcill up to four Abovefunction Cards to provide the maximum 8 Megabytes of expanded memory for your PC 
system. 

Reason 2: More Functions 

In addition to e.xpanded memory, the American Abovefunction Card includes commonly used features, such as a 
serial, parallel and game port and real-time clock/calendar, all on one board. 

The American Abovefunction Card has Cache Memory, an enhanced disk buffer software that is transparent to the 
user and gives up to four times faster hard disk access. RAM disk and print buffer capabilities are also contained on the 
EMM (Expanded Memory Manager)/Utility Diskette. 

Reason 3: Maximized Slot Usage 

Plan for the future with the American Abovefunction Card. One card provides your memory and multi-function needs 
in one I/O expansion slot. This frees valuable slot space for other enhancements. 

Reason 4: Compatibility 

The American Abovefunction Card is based on Lotus" /Intel ‘/Microsoft* specifications and is compiatible with Intel’s 
Above* Board. 

Reason 5: Price 

And, one of the best reasons of all, the American value: $725.00 (includes 2 Megabytes RAM) and $345.(X) (0K) 


AUTHORIZED DISTRIBUTOR AND SERVICE CENTERS: 


California Micro. Inc. 

LoS Anoeles. CA (800) 792-6500 
(magirw Computers 
(k>leta.CA(800) 344-2964 
PC Land. Inc. 

Tustin.CA (714) 730-6723 
Computer Professionals 
LaKewood, CO (303) 232-4009 
Computer Penpheral Warehouse. In 
Deerfield Beach. PL (305) 481-2170 


5K Computers 
Orlando. FL (600) 624-3250 
The Super So-jrce 
Noicross.GA (800) 241-8579 
Mid America 

Carmel. IN (317) 8463101 
CPU OistritMdion. Inc. 
Burnsville. MN (612) 894-9310 
Asibem. Inc- 

eiuespring, MO (816) 229-2442 


Computer Wholesalers 
Lincoln. NE (402) 466-1962 
Micro Configuration East. Inc. 
Brooklyn. NY (718) 941-2512 
Microsel 

Oklahoma City. OK (405) 787-4354 
Omega Data 

Hillsboro. OR (503) 640-3995 
Power House Sales 
Sioux Pans. SO (605) 3367181 


American Computer Distributing 
Chananooga. TN (615) 870-1073 
Columbia Data Systems. Inc 
CoKimbta. TN (615) 361-4650 
Omega Data 

Kirkland, WA (206) 823-9769 
Inter-Micro Distributor IrCc 
Alberta. Canada (403) 438-3997 
Pans Sud Electronique Composant 
Pans. Prance (1) 69 20 66 99 


MAJOR DEALERS; 

Compuierland of Whittier 
WhitTier.CA (213) 9468321 
EIck-tek. Inc. 

Ctncago. IL (312) 677-7660 
Inacomp (^puter Center 
Cohimbus. OH (614) 431-2230 
tnacomp Computer Center 
Saginaw. Ml (517) 790-1360 


American 

COMPUTER & PERIPHERAL. INC. 

Corporate OHice: 2720 Croddy Way, Santa Ana, CA 92704 USA • Tel: (714) 545-2004 • Fax: (714) 545-2146 
Northeastern Oflice: 826 Busch Court. Columbus, OH 43229 USA • Tel: (614) 846-5433 • Fax: (614) 846-7656 

*Abov»< u netioo. IBM. Lotua MM AboveartOMacroaon vatradamarksof AmencanConipulare Peripharal. Intarrsaional Buamaa* Machinaa. Lotua Davalopmaoi. MM and Mic r oaof i Co*ppf M iona, ftapa ctf v ai y 


CIRCLE 117 ON READI R SERVICE CARD 





dBase 36sec 52sec 56sec 


FormSort 52sec Imin 5sec IminlOsec 


AUt -afgmuc**- ’ . pujpui. - d ' ■ Jiffcutn*! prflumulK* *« 

drpmdml rn 4 pp 4 ii 4 »>^ 

A moment’s investment today 
can pay off royally tomorrow. 

Call (800) 321-7661. In California, 

(800) 368-7300, 

And call quickly. Every moment wasted 
is a potentially profit- 
able moment you'll 
never possess again. 

PBtSOMLCOMPlIIBIS 

BECAUSE TIME IS THE 
ULTIMATE BOTTOM UNE. 

mir.r IBM PL-AT «t>J K XTjkt niManl 

• Mj^htnn ln«cl nnkmirk (Mr) lorpMilKin 

.. . .'d itjJmurk >.-f U-fi^paq Compuin Cotfx IxMktnd 

.r ■ jti nvAtrd tT*Jr<Twik> nt LfltiB Dn«li>r*n(TM Coqnrfiwn dlUw • • iqpMnid 
liailrtibiik . I AsbMi 'bit 


ITT 


Lotus 1-2-3 llsec 13sec 15sec 


You can’t buy time. 

Long before Queen Elizabeth I, man 
begpn his quest to hoard that most precious 
and elusive of commodities. Time. 

He can only make 
better use of the few 
hours he already has. 

Hence, the devel- 
opment of today's 
business computer. 


The ITT XTRAtmXP. Our 
crowning achievement. 

By matching memory to the muscle of 
the Intel 80286 microprocessor, we're able 
to achieve "no wait states!' 

Processing never pauses for slower 
memory. 

Making the ITT XTRA XP thirty per- 
cent faster than the IBM AT And fully 
XT-compatible. 

Giving you speed and flexibility. 

Because, being a corporation of many 
businesses, we're in a unique position to 
better understand what you need to grow. 
Today, as well as tomorrow. 


The 1 1 1 XTRA XP desktop personal computer 


nr 

COMPAQ 

IBM 

XTRAXP 

286 

PC/AT 






VIKWPOINTS 

■ STEPHEN MANES 


Networking: 

A ROCKY ROAD 

For small businesses, networks are definitely the wave of the future — the distant future. For 
now, sharing resources is often a fast track to frustration. 



T he newly pmmoled director of a 
professional association I greatly re- 
spect is about to drag her five-per- 
son office into the computer age. It's truly 
a start-from-scratch job: in the current 
steam-age setup, an electric typewriter 
qualifies as a major luxury, and the only 
microprocessors may be in the employees’ 
wristwatches. 

Ideally, my friend the director will set 
up a database of membership records and 
use it as a resource for mailings, account- 
ing, financial projections, and anything 
else she can think of What she really 
needs, say the experts, is a local area net- 
work or some sort of multiuser system. 
What she’s getting is a couple of ATs, a 
couple of PCs. and a couple of printers. 
For now she’ll share data on high-density 
floppies; somewhere down the road, she’ll 
spring for a couple of Bernoulli Boxes. 
She’s undoubtedly making the right 
choice. 

Snookered To hear some people tell 
it, sharing computer resources is absolute- 
ly the only way for a small business to 
go — especially if it hopes ever to become a 
big business. To hear those who’ve been 
snookered by such claims, however, shar- 
ing resources is more often than not a high- 
speed road to frustration, pain, and ruin. 
Even the nomenclature is confusing. 
Quick: is IBM’s PC Network the Token 
Ring Network by another name? 

You need a guide in order to avoid such 
stumbling blocks before you take the long 
and winding ride down the shared-re- 
source road. Unfortunately, the guide is 


called a ‘ ‘consultant, ’ ’ and the meter keeps 
running and running even if you never 
quite get to your destination. Consultants 
love shared-resource systems because 
that’s what they cut their teeth on in the 
mainframe and minicomputer worlds and 
the consultant is quite often the only one 
with a thumb in the leaky dike along the 
highway. In the Holland of yore, the kid 
performed his services for free; American 
consultants’ digits tend to be somewhat 
pricier. 

So it's no wonder so many small opera- 
tions keep stalling when it comes to hook- 
ing their PCs together. After all, in corpo- 
rations and biggish small businesses, 
data-prtxessing experts are on-staff or on- 
call to get systems running and take care of 
the inevitable problems. In the rest of the 
world, the microcomputer user generally 
sets up and maintains the system without 
benefit of an on-site professional. That 
makes noncorporate users rather fussy; it 



also demands that they understand a fair 
amount about what's going on. Moreover, 
noncorporate PC users detest paying for 
support; their budget for this item is often 
limited to the cost of phone calls to dealers 
and friends. 

PICK A NUMBER Increasingly, the 
way a small business gets computerized is 
that the boss gets hold of his nephew’s PC, 
discovers what a help it is, and decides to 
go farther. But by then he’s become used 
to microcomputer programs that display at 
least a modicum of elegaiKe right off the 
shelf. The last thing he wants is the clunky 
pick-a-number menu, lame data-entry- 
form structure, and second-rate text-edit- 
ing software typical of the ported main- 
frame and minicomputer software that’s 
most commonly offered for vertical mar- 
kets and many shared-resource environ- 
ments. 

Worse, he isn’t exactly oveijoyed when 
he discovers he may have to share the pro- 
cessing speed of his machine with half a 
dozen other folks. “Adequate response 
time” in the mainftame world is “too 
damned long" in the land of the single- 
user AT. The choices often boil down to 
working with desirable software slowed to 
a crawl or using mainframe-type stuff 
that’s painfully out of date. 

There are plenty of other rocks in the 
toad to shared resources. Who’s going to s 
plan the physical cabling? Who’s actually | 
going to be the one to run the cables | 
through the walls? Who’s going to mind | 
the printer when the guy across the hall | 
from it decides to tun a big job? Setting up s 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
125 




■ STEPHEN MANES 


V I K W P () I N T S 



rity to worry about. Backup is a problem 
even with standalones; what are you in for 
when you've got to back up everybody's 
work, all at once? Losing your spr^sheet 
of projections for next year isn't tragic; los- 
ing your company's entire flnancial and 
customer database is a subject fit for a 
Sophocles. 

Where do you turn when things go 
wrong? The original consultant is probably 
the one who got you into this mess in the 
first place, and your friends can't help. A 
second opinion may cost thousands of si- 
moleons. And things will go wrong. When 
the system goes down for a day, the whole 
company will gel paid for standing around 
in Bob Hope emulation mode. 

The worst part is that the level of inte- 
gration the small-business user really 
wants probably isn't available and may not 
be for a good long while. The dream is a 
program that dynamically updates every- 
thing from financial projections to mailing 
lists to monthly books with each new piece 
of data entered. The reality is a series of 
less-than-elegant data-massage sessions 
that can be performed faster on single-user 
machines than on the hobbled octopi of 
shared resources. 

Shared systems may be the wave of the 
future, but for small businesses that future 
is more distant than a lot of people think. 
It's likely to take 80386-based machines, 
an operating system that can fully access 
their capabilities and still run PC-DOS ap- 
plications, and highly complex new soft- 
ware. Until the guy whose head is on the 
line (and in small operations, that head is 
very hard to hide) feels confident about be- 
ing able to buy the thing, set it up, and keep 
it running all by himself, the shared system 
is something many small operations will 
rightly continue to do without. 

I'll bet the complexity of shared sys- 
tems is as much as anything else responsi- 
ble for the success of Bernoulli Boxes. Got 
a database bigger than a single floppy but 
smaller than 20 megabytes? Stick it on the 
Bernoulli and walk it to the unit across the 
hall. Or hook up two hard-disk machines 
with a null-modem cable for half an hour. 
These may not be elegant ways to share re- 
sources. but they're safe, easy to imple- 
ment, and relatively cheap. And you don't 
need a consultant to understand them or 
keep them running. lij 

6 


a network's a whole lot more complicated 
than running down to the local Computer- 
Land. pointing to a couple of boxes of 
hardware and software, and running the 
Visa card through the machine. 


A TRAGEDY IN THE MAKING Any- 
one who remembers tbe original PC learn- 
ing experience is bound to view the new 
complex situation with a certain cynicism. 
Now there's system, file, and record integ- 


CIRCLE 230 ON READER SERVICE CARD 

PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 19 
125 


THE FIRST THING ON 
YOUR SCHEDULE 
SHOULD BE SOFTEXT'S 
SCHEDUUNG AND CONTROL 




Softext's Scheduling and Control 
offers the most iradiltonal project 
management tools wirli the best 
prjce/performance ratio Its lutonaJ 
not only helps you learn the pro- 
gram twf offers a basic course in 
project management as well. The 
program is the easiest of the bunch 
to gel up and running. 






No wonder 
PC Mogoxine Picked 
Softext's Scheduling and 
Control Program as its Editor's Choice! 

It's the best Price/Performance package in the whole flock. 

For $95 you con be planning, trocking, charting, budgeting ond following projects 
the first time you start up the program. There is an easy to follow tutorial for those 
who hove never done project monogement. with a simple menu driven program that 
makes project scheduling so easy that even old pro's love it. 

Output to Screen, File or Printer provides for Budget and Resource Reports, Gantt 
charts CPM or PERT methods. EST/EFT or LFT/LST analysis. DOS 2.0 or higher. 

ANOTHER SOFTEXT'S WINNERI 1 1 

SP'STAT - Using a spread*sheet like editor SP STAT provides a complete ond powerful 
stotistic onalysis and forecosting system. It allows input from Lotus 1>2>3. dBASES, 
Microsoft Multiplon and other file formots. $295. 

See your dealer, or coll 1-212*9M-59B5. 

Its the very first thing to put on 
your schedule. 


17 Eost 4Sth Street. New ^rk, N.Y. t0017 





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PFS Plan 76 

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DATA IASI MANAGIMlirr 


Cupper S 339 

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Extended Report Wnter 74 

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leading Edge Word Processor 48 S»nna Word 111 

leading Edge wrP with Spell & Merg 72 samna Word fVis 

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Basic Compiler (Microsoftl 

C Conplief IMiaosofi) 

CoOd Corrpiler jMiaosoft) .... 

Fortran Compiief (Mwosoftl .... 

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Macro Assemplet (Microsoft) 84 

Run C Interpreter 82 

Ryan McFarlan Fortran 305 I DiR . . . 

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Pascal Compiier (Mcrosoft) 166 Co^rwrite . 

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Tut© Pascal 30 38 DRDOS . . 

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Turbo Prolog 54 Homebase . 

Turbo DataBase Tod Box 30 Gem Cdiection 


Smart Spell Checker 
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Call voikswriter Scieniific 

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Word Perfect Library 

{219 Word PerfeafVer 4 I) 

249 Wordstar w/Tutor 331 
384 WordstarProPack33I 
^95 Wordaar 2000 2 0 . . 
242 Wordstar 2000 Plus 2 0 


TtAININC 

Righi Simulator 

Mastertype 23 

Mrd ftober 26 

PC Logo 75 

Turbo Tutor 19 

Typing In^truaor 28 

Typ«ig . . 20 


Gem Desktop . 


, Keywjrks 

’ MKfOSOfl Windows . 


Norton Commander . . . . 
Norton UMiDes 31 . . . . 

PC Tods 

Printworks 

Prokey40 

Sidekick 

MOMIT MAMAOnmiT SidekKk'Superkey Bundle 

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CompuServe Starter Kit Be« Price Udock A. B or C 

Crosstalk XVI $ 92 XTree 

Microsoft Access Call 

PFS Access 76 DtMfTTES 

Remcxe 92 Maxell MD-2 |Oiy 100) 

Sm«coml( 83 Sony MD-2 lOty 100) 


6AAnMCS«KI 

Chaitmafler 

Click Art PuWishef 

Diagram Master 

Enercharts 

Energrapixs 20 

Freelance 

Gem Graph 

Gem Word Chart 

Generx CAD w/Doi Plot 

Grapnicwmer Combo 

In-A-Viswn 

Mxrosoft Buss Mouse 

Microsoft Chart 

Microsoft Serial Mouse 

News Room 

PC Draw 

PC Mouse wiDr Ha© ii 
PC Mouse wiPamt Plus 

PFS Graph 

Prmtmasier 

Print Shop 

Signmaster 

Turbo Graphtx Tod Box 
Windows Draw" . 


Acctssoiin 

Copy II Opoon Board 

Masterpiece 

Masterpiece Mus 

Summasketch 12x12 Tablet 


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with each system 


Turbo PC/XT W/256X S I Drive 
Turbo PC/XT W/640K S I Drive . . , 
Turbo POXTW/640KS 2 Drives . 
Turbo PC/XT W/640K, I Drive & 20 MG 
MooGraphics Card with Software 

and Parallel Printer Port 

Cokx Card 

with Parallel Pnnter Pon 

Multifunction Card w/Software 

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Color Monitor (RGB) 

Sega Enhanced Graphics Card 
I/O Card lSenal/Parallel| . 

I/O Card (Sertal/Clock Calendar 

I/O Card (Parallell 

5151 Clone Keyboard , . 


AnadM Pnmm . . 
Bfothef Pnntpfs . . 
Canon Laser Prmtef 
CrtwnPnnters . . 

MSP-IO 

MSP-15 

MSP-20 

MSP-2S 

Data South Pnnters 
Diablo 0-2S .... 
635 


OumeOVI Green 101 
QVT Amber 101 ... . 

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50 

\byse 75 

Miryse 85 

Wyw 350 

2erwh2-22 

Z-29A 

Z-49 


Pansonk 

Sr. Partner 

Exet. Partner Dual Drive 
Sptr^ 

Sperry IT ....... . 

Other Model] 

Toshiba 

MlOO 

wyse 

ttiysepc llOO-l .... I 
«ysep( 1100-20 . . . . 

Zenith 


Alpru Orrvga turtn Osk Or%« 
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20 Meg 

20Megnu5 

Aipna Omega Tunw to . . 

tiftio20 

TurDoK 

faradse Mantosfi Karo OtU . . 


Anchor Automation 

^horEapress 

Anchor Mod^ 

AT 4 T «i00 External . . . 
Hayes Smartnxxlem 300 . . 
H^es Smartmodem 1200 . 
H^Smartmodem 12006 
Smartmcdem 24006 


MONITOtS 

Amdek Morwors 

NEC Monitors 

Pnnceton Graphics Monrtors - . . 
Zenith Monitors 

KiriOAtDS 

KeytromcsSISI 

DISKS 

Maxell MO-2 Oty 100 




Prometheus 12308 


US Pobotxs ^ssword 1200 
US Robotics Couner 2400 . 
Microlink 2400 


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AST Advantage 

AST Six Pack Pus 

AST Rampage 

Hercutes Cotor Caro 

Hercules Graphics Card . . . 

Intel ^xne Board 

Maynard Hardcard . 

Paradise 5 Pack 

Parad5e Modular Graphic . . . 

Quad EGA Rjs 

Ouadram Gold'Siiver Boards . . . 

Ouadfcnk 

Tecmar Graphics Master 

Tecmar Captain (No Memoryl . . 


Canon PC- 10 
Canon PC- 1 4 
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CIRCLE 206 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


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Juki 6300 

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NEC 3510. 3550. 3515J530 

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NEC 6810. 6830. 06650 

. . . 1039 

1 tMdaaPhnnn ....... 

■•“1 

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Call 

ParsasonK 1080 

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Panasonc 1091 

... 239 

Panasorw 1092 

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Panasonic 1592 

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Panasonic KXW 151 

. . 399 

SiNer Reed Printers 

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Microsoft Cont. 

C Compiler 

Fortran Compiler . 

. 227 
. 204 



AshtomTste 


Macro Assembler . 

. 89 

Epson 


All Products 

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Multiplan 

. 122 

All Products 

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Borland 


MuMath/MuSimp . 

. 189 

duki 


All Products 

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Pascal Compiler . . 

. 174 

6100P 

.$369 

Central Point 


Project 

. 199 

6300P 

. 669 

Copy II PC 

.$ 29 

Quick Basic 


OkIdeta 


Option Board 

. 64 

Compiler 

. 65 

182P 

$229 

Computor Support 

Windows 

. 60 

192P 

. 359 

Diagraph 

.$329 

MIcrostuf 


193P 

. 470 

CompuVIow 


Crosstalk (DOS) . . 

.$ 95 

2410P 

.1705 

Vedil 

.$130 

Remote 

. 95 

Panasonic 


Connoctleut Softwr. 

Transporter 

. 143 

AH Products 

. .Call 


All Products Call 

Data Transforms 

Fontrix S 99 

Dacision Rasourcas 

Chart Master $215 

Diagram Master ... 219 

Sign Master 159 

Digital Marketing 

Grammatik $ 60 

Number 79 

Proofreader 42 

Digital Rasaarch 

All Products Call 

Exacutiva Systams 
X-TREE $ 30 

Fifth Qanaratlon 

Pastback $ 99 

Fox E Oaliar 

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Funk Software 

Sideways $ 45 

Individual Softwr. 
Typing Instructor ..$28 
LIfatraa Software 
Volkswriter 
Scientific . . . 
Volkswriter 3 . 

Max Think 


$279 

149 


Multimata Systams 
All Products Call 

Oasis 

Punctuation & 

Style $95 

Word Plus 110 

Paperback Software 

VP Planner $69 

Pater Norton 

Norton Util (v.3.0) ..$59 

Quarterdeck 

DESQview $ 69 

Rosasoft 

Prokey (V. 4.0) $ 89 

Satellite Software 

Word Perfect w/Sp. .$197 
Personal Word 
Perfect 99 

Softcraft 

Fancy Fonts $129 

Fancy Word 119 

Software Group 

Enable $419 

Software Publishing 
PFS: File. Graph. Plan, 
Write, Access. Report 

ea. $ 79 

Software Research 


Max Think 

.$ 73 

Smartkey (v.5.1) . . 

..$ 39 

Micro Pro 


w/FRtE Smartprint 

Wordstar 2000 . . . 

.$255 

Star Softwara 


Wordstar 2000+ . 

. 278 

Acct. Partner . . . . 

..$189 

WS Professional . 

. 249 

Acct. Partner H . 

. . 459 

MicrorIm 


XV Quasi 


Ext. Report Writer 

.$ 75 

XY Write III 

. .$289 

Rbase 5000 

. 329 

Zylab 


Microsoft 


Zylndex 

. .$109 

Bus. Basic 


Zylndex Prof . . . 

. . 209 

Compiler 

.$259 

Zylndex + 

.. 479 





Amdak 


Tatung 


310A 

$159 

1370 Hi Res. . . . 

$629 

600 

429 



722 

512 

640 

$569 

Mac 

Multi Sync. . 

$569 

Tacmar 

811400 

$615 

Max 12 

$149 

Thompson 

Call 

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390 

All models 

HX12E .... 

474 

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SR 12 

759 

l220GorA .... 

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Quadram 


1240 

169 

1 Quadscreen 6500 .. .$1449 

1330 

419 

1 CH8400 . . . . 

489 

1360 

579 


Hayes 

Smartmodem 1200 .$362 

SM1200B 359 

SM2400B 535 

Smartmodem 2400 . 589 
U.S. Robotics 
2400 Micro Link 
Modem $449 


AST Research 

Six Pak Plus 

W/64K $160 

Advantage (AT) 

128K 369 

Everex 

The Edge $229 

Graphics Edge .... 239 

Herculas 

Graphics Board . . . .$283 
Color Card 149 

Quadram 

QuadboardS4K . . . .$199 
Tall Tree Systems 

JRAM3-POK $179 

JRAMAT-3 0K 229 

D'vXvm 

Plus Development 

Hard Card (10MB) . . .Call 
Mountain Computers 
Hard Card (20MB). . .Call 

DrivAS for tho IBM 
and Compatibloa 
20MB HO w/cntrir 
Everex Everdlsk . .$439 
Seagate (ST 225, 1/2 

Hi. 65 MS) 449 

Seagate (ST 4026, Full 

Hi. 40 MS) 689 

30MB HD w/cntrtr 
Everex Everdlsk 
(ST 4038. Full 

Hi.40MS) $769 

Seagate (ST 4038. Full 

Hi.45MS) 779 

40MB HD w/cntrtr . Call 


AST 3G 1256 $369 

Genoa Spectra EGA $309 

Persyst EGA Call 

Quadram EGA + $409 

Sigma EGA $389 

STB EGA + $339 

Tecmar EGA Master $289 

Video 7 Vega $392 


OrlvM for IBM 
AT Only 
20MB HD wiralls 

Everex Everdlsk 

(St 4026. Full 

Hi.40MS) $549 

Saagata (ST 4026, Full 


Hl.iOMS) 

. 569 

30MB HD w/ralts 


Evorox Everdlsk 


(ST 4038. Full Hi. 


40MS) 

$669 

Rodims (lf203E. Full 

Hi.40MS) 

679 

40MBHDw/ralls . . . 

.Call 


Tap# Back Up 
Systems 
Evarax Intarnal 

Excel Stream 20 
(PC. XT) $679 


Evarax Intarnal 
Cent. 

Excel Stream 60 

(XT) 769 

Excel Stream 60 

(AT) 789 

Evarax Bxtarnal 
Excel Stream 20 

(PC. XT) $799 

Excel Stream 60 

(PC, XT. AT) 879 

Excel Stream 100 

(PC. XT. AT) 999 

■•Omaga 

10MB Bern. Box ..$1569 
10 -t- 10 Bern. Box. .2299 
20M6 Bern. Box ...1969 
20 + 20 Bern. Box. .2895 
Call for card prices. 
Irwin 

Tape Drive 1*1 10D ..$499 
Backup tape 
subsys 709 


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products we carry. If you're interested in 
something not listed, PLEASE CALL! 



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VIEWPOINTS 

■ STEWART ALSOP 


Designing the 

PERFECT PC FOR 
THE HOME 

If IBM can’t create a home market for PC-DOS software, who can? The most likely 
candidates are Tandy and Commodore, but maybe IBM should give it another try. 



T he fact is, as I began to describe in 
my last column, IBM made it very 
difficult to have fun on the origin^ 
PC. I don't mean the kind of fun that the 
guys in basements with plastic pen protec- 
tors have. I mean the kind of fun that most 
normal human beings find entertaining: 
playing games. 

IBM had the right idea with the PCy'r, 
except that it designed the computer not to 
compete with the original PC, thus making 
it an unattractive choice for most people. 
In other words, IBM’s supplying the com- 
puter with color graphics and a sound chip 
was smart; its giving the PCjr a toylike 
keyboard and limited memory and disk 
drives was not. 

The death of the PCjr last year persuad- 
ed most manufacturers that there was no 
home market for a PC-DOS computer. 
And the lack of success for most DOS en- 
tertainment programs has persuaded soft- 
ware publishers, many of whom had been 
"burned” by publishing programs for the 
PCjr, that business programs are the only 
sure bet for IBM-compatible computers. If 
IBM couldn’t create a home market for 
DOS software, the publishers asked, who 
could? 

A STAR IS INTRODUCED One manu- 
facturer, however, wasn’t put off by 
IBM’s failure with the PCjr. In the fall of 
1984, Tandy Corp. introduced its Model 
1000 personal computer, a fully compati- 
ble PC for just $1,095. It began selling 
well immediately and was one of the few 
stars of the 1984 Christmas sales season. 
That was particularly nice for Tandy, 


which had been having a tough time sell- 
ing its other computers since IBM came 
into the market in 198 1 . 

But then, last fall, Tandy began bun- 
dling the computer with a color monitor (it 
comes with color graphics built in) for the 
unheard-of price of $999. People liked that 
even better. And a funny thing happened 
on the way to creating a hot personal com- 
puter: entertainment software companies 
discovered that games and educational 
programs that they had previously pub- 
lished for the IBM PC were suddenly be- 
ginning to sell much better. Not surpris- 
ingly, the people buying those programs 
turned out to be mostly Tandy 1000 own- 
ers, not PC, XT, or A'T owners. 

Thus, Tandy managed to show that 
there is indeed a home market for DOS 
programs, as long as there’s a computer 
designed and priced to appeal to consum- 
ers. Tandy’s success with the Model 1000, 
of course, begs the next question. Since 



Tandy sells its computers only through its 
own Radio Shack stores and Tandy Com- 
puter Centers, why hasn’t another compa- 
ny jumped into the fray with a home-ori- 
ented DOS computer to sell through 
independent computer dealers and mass 
merchants? 

OPPORTUNITY KNOCKS Here’s a 
golden opportunity for a computer compa- 
ny that understands consumers and is will- 
ing to take a chance on their fickleness. 
Here’s how that company should design 
the perfect DOS home computer: 

"rhe very first consideration for any new 
home computer is price. IBM discovered 
that people would put up with the PCjr's 
deficiencies if it was priced at about $800, 
including color monitor. Tandy, selling a 
better computer, has been able to com- 
mand $999 for its machine. In other for- 
mats, Commodore still sells a lot of 64s 
with great sound, OK color, and a terribly 
slow disk drive for about $500. Apple sells 
a lot of color He’s with a disk drive, great 
color, lousy sound, and I28K bytes of 
memory for about $950. Given all that evi- 
dence, it’s clear that the market for the per- 
fect DOS home computer has a ceiling: the 
machine must be priced at less than 
$1 ,000, preferably closer to $900. 

Within that price constraint, you can ac- 
tually design a really neat machine. First, 
you need a basic 256K-byte PC with a 
floppy disk drive (including at least three 
bus slots). If you set out to build it inexpen- 
sively (using surface-mount manufactur- 
ing, for instance, plus some very-large- 
scale integration to reduce the number of 


I 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUSTI986 
131 



V I 1. w I' () I N r s 

■ STEWART ALSOP 


chips), an aggressive manufacturer can 
probably deliver the basic machine for 
roughly S500. 

That leaves about $450 for the rest of 
the computer. For that money, you can 


easily build in color graphics, sound, and a 
few .special features. Building in standard 
color graphics, as Tandy (and others) has 
already done, is a safe bet. But enhanced 
graphics would be even better. And Para- 


dise Systems has a single chip that could be 
easily mounted on the motherboard and 
that delivers both standard and enhaneed 
graphics. I don't know much about sound 
chips. However. I imagine that someone 
has a nice four-voice chip that could also 
be mounted on the motherboard. Add a 
printer port and at least two built-in joy- 
stick ports, and you've got an extremely 
hot home eomputer that can easily double 
as an expandable work-at-home computer. 

SOME LIKELY CANDIDATES So 

who's likely to develop such a computer'.’ 
Two companies are perfeetly positioned to 
intnxJuce a home-oriented DOS computer 
that would be sold through independent 
dealers. 

Most obvious is Commtxlore. which is 
already doing quite well selling inexpen- 
sive DOS computers in Europe. Commo- 
dore. having sold some 3 million Commo- 
dore 64s. has the manufaeturing and 
distribution capability to build and pro- 
mote such a computer successfully. If the 
company took a chance and pushed a DOS 
computer into mass-market stores like 
Toys-R-Us or Sears, it could probably 
build enough volume to allow it to drop the 
price to about $700. 

Most interesting, though, the other 
company that's in a position to sell a IX)S 
home computer is IBM itself. Unlike its 
situation 3 years ago. when it announced 
thePCy'r. IBM'sbasic PC. a computer that 
hasn't been reengineered in 5 years, is now 
facing stiff competition from overseas. 
Since that time, the XT has become the 
workhorse business machine, and business 
buyers are beginning to look more and 
more toward newer computers like the AT 
or possibly a computer with the 80386 pro- 
ces,sor as the future standard. That leaves 
the PC a sort of orphan, waiting to be intel- 
ligently redesigned fora new life as a home 
computer. 

Wouldn't it be ironic if Tandy/Radio 
Shack, the nation's electronics hobby 
store, ended up showing IBM, the nation's 
computer company, the right way to build 
a home computer'.’ That would represent a 
kind of prxttic justice for Tandy , one of the 
three original pioneers of the personal 
computer market and the one possibly 
most hurt by IBM'sentry into the market 5 
years ago. Si) 




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PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 19«6 
132 






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COVER STORY ■ STEWART ALSOP 


The 

Enhanced 
Graphics- 
StandarcE 
Comes^ 
ofAge^ 


A new crop of video adapters compatible 
with IBM’s Enhanced Graphics 
Adapter has turned the EG A from a 
nice option into the new display standard. 


Many of you use a PC 
equipped with a basic 
green monochrome moni- 
tor and a monochrome dis- 
play adapter. Some of you 
have added a Hercules Graphics Card so 
that you can see what you're doing to your 
1-2 3 graphs. Some have invested in a col- 
or monitor and a color/graphics adapter. A 
few of the more adventuresome (and well 
financed) among you even have splurged 
on an enhanced color monitor and an en- 
hanced graphics adapter. 

And therein lies the problem with dis- 
playing graphics: Everybody's got some- 
thing different. Designing software with 
graphics that can play on whatever equip- 
ment is available is both time-consuming 
and distracting, since creating a display is 
not usually the primary objective of most 
software. 

Last fall, something happened that 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
141 


■ GRAPHICS STANDARD 


promises to alleviate the industry's embar- 
rassment of graphics standards. That 
something was the popularization of the 
enhanced graphics adapter, usually called 
EGA. In a matter of months, available 
EGA boards increased from a restricted 
supply of a single, fairly expensive model 
made by IBM to mote than a dozen fully 
compatible models made by independent 
manufacturers. (An accompanying article, 
“Achieving the Standard: 12 EGA 
Boards," discusses 11 of the enhanced 
graphics adapters competing with IBM’s.) 

IN THE BEGINNING When IBM in- 
troduced the PC in 1981, color graphics 
was not considered an important or even 
relevant aspect of business computing. In 
fact, computers that featured color graph- 
ics, such as the Apple II, the Radio Shack 
Color Computer, and the Commodore 64, 
were largely viewed as home computers. 
IBM didn't set out to build a home com- 
puter, and so it focused on producing a 
computer for which it believed the stan- 
dard would be an 80-chatacter by 25-line 
monochrome display. But IBM didn’t 
want to completely ignore the home and 
educational markets, and so it offered as an 
option a color/graphics adapter (common- 
ly known as CGA) that is capable of dis- 
playing four basic colors in resolutions of 
640 dots by 200 lines and 320 dots by 2(X) 
lines. 

The marketplace decided, as it often 
does, that IBM’s product introductions 
were not sufficient. IBM’s monochrome 
display adpater couldn’t display graphical 
images, and IBM’s color card couldn’t 
combine color with 80-column text. 

Hercules Computer Technology soon 
offered a partial solution: the Hercules 
Graphics Card, a monochrome graphics 
adapter that displays graphics on a stan- 
dard monochrome monitor at a resolution 
of 720 dots by 348 lines. Several other 
companies tried to develop higher-resolu- 
tion graphics adapters, but none was able 
to generate enough support from software 
developers to make its product a universal 
standaid, as the Hercules card had be- 
come. As a result, by 1984 the industry 
was selling four different "standard” dis- 
play adapters for color and monochrome 
text and graphics, none of which allowed 
you to display both graphics and text on a 


single high-resolution color monitor. 

Meanwhile, Compaq Computer Corp. , 
improving on IBM’s design for the first 
time (but not the last), built into its com- 
puters a combination monochrome and co- 
lor/graphics adapter that could display 
both readable text and standard IBM 
graphics on Compaq’s built-in mono- 
chrome monitor and let you plug in a color 
monitor to display color graphics. Compaq 
demonstrated to the industry that it wasn’t 
necessary to put customers through the 
wringer if they wanted to display graphics, 
color, or monochrome. Compaq owners 
had to invest in a color monitor only if they 
wanted color. 

FINALLY, A STANDARD The dissatis- 
faction within the industry didn’t amount 
to much, however, because the only com- 

■ At first, customers met 
IBM’s enhanced graphics 
adapter with an enhanced 
yawn. 


pany with the ability to create universally 
supported standards for IBM personal 
computers was IBM itself and IBM was 
taking its sweet time. Finally, in Septem- 
ber 1984, just a month after IBM an- 
nounced the PC AT, the PC Network, and 
PC-DOS 3.0, it sneaked in an announce- 
ment of two new graphics adapters: the 
Enhanced Graphics Adapter and the Pro- 
fessional Graphics Controller (the latter, a 
very high resolution board suitable for 
CAD-type applications, is very expensive 
and has yet to catch on). 

IBM’s Enhanced Graphics Adapter is a 
long add-in board that can display 16 col- 
ors at a resolution of 640 by 350 (it can dis- 
play graphics written for the older Color/ 
Graphics ‘Adapter at that adapter’s lower 
resolutions). With its higher resolution, it 
can also display readable text in one or 
more colors. The board comes with 64K of 
display memory (random-access memory 
that creates a buffer for graphic images 
waiting to be displayed) and can use as 


much as 256K of display memory installed 
on a daughterboard. 

At first, customers met IBM’s En- 
hanced Graphics Adapter with an en- 
hanced yawn, for several reasons. First 
and foremost was its high price: $985 for a 
board outfitted with maximum display 
memory plus another $7(X) for the en- 
hanced color monitor needed to display the 
increased resolution and additional colors. 
Second, when IBM introduced the En- 
hanced Graphics Adapter, no software ex- 
isted to take advantage of its features. 

Third, and possibly most frustrating, 
the Enhanced Graphics Adapter is just 
barely compatible with the Color/Graphics 
Adapter. Software developers, by nature 
undisciplined and unrestrained, had 
played a number of tricks with the Color/ 
Graphics Adapter, and IBM’s EGA can’t 
deal with programs that use those tricks. In 
addition, the board can’t display graphics 
written to support Hercules’s monochrome 
graphics. 

In mid- 1 985, if you wanted to display 
high-resolution graphics but also wanted 
to be scrupulously compatible with every 
program developed, you had to buy two 
monitors (monochrome and enhanced col- 
or) and as many as three display adapters. 
The actual cost of displaying high-resolu- 
tion color graphics was close to $2,0(X). As 
a result, just a year ago, most people in the 
industry didn’t think IBM’s Enhanced 
Graphics Adapter would become the 
much-anticipated high-resolution color 
graphics standard. 

In September 1985 a startup company 
with the odd name of Chips & Technol- 
ogies atuiounced its EGA CHIPSet, a set 
of 4 chips that handles the functions of 19 
of IBM’s proprietary chips on the En- 
hanced Graphics Adapter. By November, 
at the huge Comdex fall trade show in Las 
Vegas, more than half-a-dozen companies 
had introduced EGA-compatible boards, 
most priced at about $600, that offered a 
standard 256K of display memory and 
were based on Chips & Technologies’ 
EGA CHIPSet. At the same time, Micro- 
soft finally released its long-awaited oper- 
ating environment, Microsoft Windows 
(see “Operating in a New Environment,” 
PC Magazine. Volume 5 Number 4) and 
emphasized that it supported the Enhanced 
Graphics Adapter as the standard for high- 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
142 






A RES BY ANY OTHER NAME 


T he old IBM Color/Graphics Adapter 
supported graphics in '■medium res- 
olution" (320 dots by 2(X) lines) and 
"high resolution" (640 dots by 200 
lines). The CGA dtxrumentation also in- 
dicated that an unsupported "low-resolu- 
tion" mode (160 dots by 2(X) lines) was 
also available. 

Calling your best resolution "high" is 
only natural, but it doesn't leave much 
room for expansion. With the EGA 
board, the 640 by 350 resolution was 
called "enhanced," but what comes af- 
terthat, “.superenhanced"'.’ 

Let's start over. Let's agree that video 


adapters are going to get better and better 
and that, in the broad scheme of things, 
the EGA will probably find its proper 
niche as an adequate medium-resolution 
video adapter. PC Magazine therefore 
proposes the following changes in ter- 
minology for IBM graphics boards: 

Resolution Old Term New Term 

640 X 350 enhanced medium res 
640 X 200 high res low res 
320 X 200 medium res very low res 
160 x 200 low res no res 

— Charles PeUold 


resolution graphics. 

One indication of the breadth of support 
that has spmng up for enhanced graphics 
comes from Corporate Software, a Can- 
ton, Massachusetts, company that sells 
software to corporations. Corporate Soft- 
ware's list of current program versions 
notes that of the more *an 200 software 
products it tracks, more than 50 now ex- 
plicitly support EGA. 

A SNAP DECISION Several develop- 
ments from manufacturers of EGA boards 
have made the PC owner’s decision to add 
high-resolution graphics much simpler. 

First, the new EGA-compatible boards 
all offer 256K of display memory as stan- 
dard; the extra memory is important for 
displaying complicated images rapidly and 
for scrolling images across the screen 
smoothly and quickly. 

Second, the new boards have estab- 
lished a lower price as the norm. Where 
IBM’s adapter cost nearly $1,000 with a 
full 256K of display memory, most of the 
compatible brands now list for just under 
$6(X) and a few are priced at less than $400 
(see the Summary of Features table in the 
accompanying article “Achieving the 
Standard: 12 EGA Boards”), Those prices 
make the extra cost of high-resolution 
graphics (for both adapter and monitor) 
about an $800 investment, down from 
$1,200 to $1,500. Indeed, as EGA-com- 
patible boards get less expensive, the small 
difference in cost between buying CGA- 
compatible and EGA-compatible board- 
and-monitor combinations is likely to ren- 
der the CGA virtually obsolete. 

Third, several of the board makers have 
taken the extra step of building in separate 
and explicit support of both IBM color 
graphics and Hercules monochrome 
graphics. Some also include other fea- 
tures, such as a printer port. At the same 
time, some monitor manufacUirets have 
built monitors, like NEC’s MultiSync, that 
can operate at different frequencies and 
display color graphics at different resolu- 
tions with different adapters without forc- 
ing you to switch monitors. 

While it is still difficult to remember all 
of the possible configurations, it is now 
possible to buy only one board and one 
monitor, on which you can run any piece 
of software — regardless of the type of 


graphics or text it supports — without hav- 
ing to remove the cover of your system 
unit to reset switches. You still need to re- 
member to reset switches or use different 
CONFIG.SYS files for some combina- 
tions. But even that requirement may dis- 
appear the Paradise Systems EGA bxrard, 
released too late to meet our deadline, is 
supposed to be able to .switch from one dis- 
play to another automatically. 

You still need to be careful about up- 
grading to high-resolution color graphics if 
you rely on software that supports only the 
IBM color graphics standard. You will 
need either to buy an adapter that can coex- 
ist with your present color adapter or re- 
place yours with a multimode card, so that 
the CGA emulation is capable of running 
your software. You will probably also 
need to invest in a multifrequency moni- 
tor, unless you want to stack your new 
monitor on top of the old one. 

HIGHER STANDARDS For all the 

glowing praise of the EGA, nearly every- 
one in the industry agrees that the EGA 
standard is merely a stopping point on the 
way to something better. There is consid- 
erable disagreement about what that better 
thing is, although there are a few indica- 
tions now of future directions. 

Future graphics standards must im- 
prove on the EGA with higher resolution, 
faster displays, and additional enhance- 
ments. This spring, the industry was rife 


with rumors that IBM would replace its ex- 
isting EGA board with one that would be 
less expensive, would include 256K of dis- 
play RAM , and might offer up to 4(X) lines 
of vertical resolution. These enhance- 
ments would be an improvement but 
would not represent a completely new 
standard, as the EGA did. The next stan- 
dard will have to offer significantly better 
resolution, probably in the range of 1 ,024 
by 1,024. 

The other improvement that would jus- 
tify a new standard would be the speed of 
display. Even an EGA display takes a sig- 
nificant amount of time to redraw a com- 
plicated graphic. One technology that 
promises to improve the speed of graphics 
displays is the graphics coprocessor. Like 
the 8087 and 80287 math coprocessors al- 
ready available for PCs, graphics co- 
processors will take some of the load off 
the main processor. Graphics routines and 
main logic routines can then be processed 
faster. Texas Instruments and Intel have 
already announced graphics coprocessors; 
both should show up on add-in video 
boards by the end of 1986. 

Whether the industry continues to offer 
competing and incompatible designs or 
moves toward a single standard, at least 
now you can get both text and graphics on 
a single high-resolution screen display. 
And you can be pretty sure that you won’t 
have to replace your graphics hardware or 
software for another 1 8 to 24 months. Ej 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
143 



Enhancer' 


T he EVEREX Enhancer is the 
IBM compatible EGA card 
that delivers value with price, 
performance, and features! 

No Options Needed. 

With other EGA cards you have to 
pay extra for options like 256K 
screen memory and a parallel 
printer port. With the Enhancer 
these features are standard and 
there are no extras to buy. 


11 Display Modes 

There’s 16 colors from a palette 
of 64 in 640x350 resolutioa Text 
is displayed in readable 8xl4 
character format in text mode. 
And the Enhancer’s monochrome 
mode can support monochrome 
graphics on a monochrome 
monitor. In addition to 6 EGA 
modes and a monochrome mode, 
there’s 4 color modes. 


Software Switched 

The Enhancer comes with 
EGMODE menu-driven software 
that lets you change di^lay 
modes, even monitors, without 
opening your chassis, with the 
push of a buttoa Useful help 
windows take all the mystery out 
of each possible di^lay mode. 
The Perfect Adapter 
For enhanced color gnqjhics, 
monochrome text, and standard 
color text and graphics, the 
EVEREX Enhancer is the jjerfcct 
ad^ter to pair up with your 
software library. Call your local 
dealer for a demo, or call EVEREX 
to get all the facts on our new 
line of video adapters. 


1 - 800 - 821-0806 1 - 800 - 821-0807 

In California 

48431 Milmont Dr. 

Fremont, CA 94538 
(415)498-1111 


EVER for EXcolience 


Enhunr Is i ndemiHi of EVEimf SY^fTEMS, INC. IBM is a mdeirark of iMrmattonal Businas Machlna Carp 


CIRCLE 154 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



I COVER STORY ■ CHARLES PETZOLD 


Achieving 

The 


Standard: 

T2EGA 

boards- 


Suddenly, EGA boards are everywhere. They 
use several different approaches to achieve 
similar results, namely brilliant colors 
and crisp text. The biggest difference: price. 


When IBM announced the 
Enhanced Graphics 
Adapter (EGA) in Septem- 
ber 1984, it was merely a 
high-priced video alterna- 
tive for the PC, XT, and AT. Now, almost 
2 years later, the EGA is a standard, as sol- 
id and as well-defined a standard as the 
IBM PC itself. 

IBM did not make the EGA a standard; 
it simply provided the model. Eleven other 
companies standardized the EGA by 
bringing their own IBM-compatible en- 
hanced graphics boards to the market. 
These EGA boards are no longer merely 
the stuff of press releases and tentative an- 
nouncements: they are real products and 
they are reviewed right here. Nor is this the 
extent of the EGA bandwagon. Several 
other major manufacturers missed our 
deadline by just a few weeks, and we are 
already planning follow-up reviews. 

More important than any other compa- 
ny in making the EGA a standard has b^n 
Chips and Technologies, whose excep- 
tionally well-designed Enhanced Graphics 
CHlPSet is used in 10 of the 12 boards 
covered in these reviews. Even some com- 
panies that started out attempting to devel- 
op their own EGA-compatible circuits 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
145 


■ EGA STANDARD 


have found the Chips and Technologies 
price — $84.50 each in lots of 1 00 — haid to 
ignore. At this point, a CHIPSet-based 
EGA board looks more like the EGA ar- 
chetype than IBM's own board does. (At 
PC Magazine'^ second annual Awards for 
Technical Excellence in April, Chips and 
Technologies' Edward Hutchins, Shyam 
K. Nagrani, and 'V'i-Hsien Hao were hon- 
ored for their contributions to the EGA 
CHlPSet. See “The Envelope, Please" in 
this issue.) 

This sudden avalanche of EGA boards 
probably heralds universal software sup- 
port for the EGA standard. While large 
software companies will continue to sup- 
port a variety of video adapters, those that 
are not able to support more than one will 
choose to support the EGA if their prod- 
ucts involve graphics. Many publishers 
have taken the plunge already, and we can 
now expect to see the EGA's 16 colors in 


640-dot by 350-line resolution in graphics 
applications regularly. 

From a purely technical perspective, 
the EGA standard is neither particularly in- 
novative nor the final word in graphics 
cards. The IBM EGA has been called the 
minimum acceptable video adapter for 
IBM PC use. For most PC users, however, 
an EGA-standard board is now the best 
choice for a video adapter. The EGA is the 
right board and, with manufacturers other 
than IQM selling EGA boards, it is now 
available at the right price. 

DEFINING THE STANDARD IBM's 
Enhanced Graphics Adapter supports 12 
video modes. 'The modes available to you 
and how they will look on the screen de- 
pend upon the amount of memory installed 
on the board and the monitor you attach . 

The accompanying table, “EGA 
Boards: Available Display Modes,” sum- 


marizes the video modes the EGA sup- 
ports. Attaching an IBM monochrome 
monitor (or equivalent) to the EGA gives 
you two video modes. Mode 7 duplicates 
the text mode on the IBM Monochrome 
Adapter. Mode 15 is a graphics mode. 
Most programs that .support EGA graphics 
will support this graphics mode since the 
memory mapping is the same as in the 
highest-resolution color mode. 

If you connect an EGA to an IBM 
Color/Graphics Display (or equivalent; see 
“The EGA Standaid: Monitors That Mea- 
sure Up,” PC Magazine. Volume 5 Num- 
ber 6), nine modes ate available to you. 
Several of the modes are the same (modes 
2 and 3, for instance) because the IBM 
Color/Gtaphics Adapter (CGA) provides 
color and black-and-white versions of 
.some video modes for composite video 
monitors. The EGA does not support com- 
posite monitors. The 4()-column and 80- 
column text modes will look the same as 
they do with a Color/Graphics Adapter, 
but the screen will not flicker when it 
scrolls. (The flickering of the CGA is 
caused by software that turns off the dis- 
play when updating video memory to pre- 
vent video “snow.” This technique is not 
necessary with the EGA.) In addition, you 
get two new graphics modes, 13 and 14, 
with the same resolution as 5 and 6, re- 
spectively, but with 1 6 colors. 

You'll get the best results when you 
connect the EGA to an IBM Enhanced 
Color Display (or equivalent). All pro- 
grams that u.se text modes will show an im- 
mediate visual improvement. Imstead of 
the grainy 8- by 8-character box. you get a 
nice 14- by 8-character box, nearly as good 
as that of the Monochrome Adapter's. 

The best graphics mode available with 
an Enhanced Color Display is mode 16, 
with a resolution of 640 x 350. With 64K 
of memory on the EGA, this mode sup- 
ports only 4 colors; 128K of memory or 
more gives you 16 colors. If you use Mi- 
crosoft Windows with a 64K EGA, it will 
use the lower-resolution mode 14. (See the 
sidebar “Six Views of Windows.”) 


The EGA video modes available to you, and 
how they will look on the screen, depend mostly 
upon the type of display used. An Enhanced 
Color Display ( or equivalent) improves the res- 
olution of all programs that use test modes. 



EGA Boards: Available Display Modes 

1 

MONOCHROME DISPLAY I 





Character 



Mode 

Type 

Resolution 

Linos X columns 

boi 

Colors 

Compatibility 

7 

Text 

720 x 350 

25x80 

14x9 

4 

Monochome 







adapter 

15 

Graphics 

640 x 350 

25x80 

14x8 

4 



COLOR GRAPHICS DISPLAY 1 





Character 



Mode 

Type 

Resolution 

Lines x columns 

box 

Colors 

Compatibility 

0&1 

Text 

320 x 200 

25x40 

8x8 

16 

Color/graphics 

2&3 

Text 

640 x 200 

25x80 

8x8 

16 

Color/graphics 

4&5 

Graphics 

320 x 200 

25x40 

8x8 

4 

Color/graphics 

6 

Graphics 

640 x 200 

25x80 

8x8 

2 

Color/graphics 

13 

Graphics 

320 X 200 

25x40 

8x8 

16 


14 

Graphics 

640 x 200 

25x80 

8x8 

16 



ENHANCED COLOR DISPLAY 1 





Character 



Mode 

Type 

Resolution 

Lines X columns 

box 

Colors 

Compatibility 

0&1 

Text 

320 x 350 

25x40 

14x8 

16 

Color/graphics 

2&3 

Text 

640x350 

25x80 

14x8 

16 

Color/graphics 

4&5 

Graphics 

320x200 

25x40 

8x8 

4 

Color/graphics 

6 

Graphics 

640x200 

25x80 

8x8 

2 

Color/graphics 

13 

Graphics 

320x200 

25x40 

8x8 

16 


14 

Graphics 

640 X 200 

25x80 

8x8 

16 


16 

Graphics 

640x350 

25x80 

14x8 

4 (w/ 64K) 






16(w/128K) 1 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
146 


Hercules compatible graphics: 
720x348. 


Plantronics compatible graphics: 
640x200x4 colors. 


Introducing The Paradise 
Hi-Res Graphics Card 
Tvo Upgrades 
For The Price Of One. 

Now you can have much higher you choose, the Paradise Hi-Res (800) 822-2020, Ext 338 . Or check 

resolution than your cun'ent video Graphics Card ^ves you full com- it out at the best PC dealers, 
card gives you. Without buying new patibility with standard video modes. A rj A 

software. Or an expensive monitor. Better yet you can use your exist- I II 1^ 

All you need is the new Paradise ing software to its best advantage. ^ 1 — < 

Hi-Res Graphics Card. Because Hercules and Plantronics systems, inc 

It gives you the highest resolution graphics are widely supported by 
possible on a standard monitor. packages like Lotus 1-2-1 Sym- 

With monochrome displays, you get phony. Framework, and lots more. 

Hercules compatible 720x348 And Paradise gives you all this, plus 

graphics. With RGB and composite a parallel port On one short card, 
displays, you get Plantronics com- If you’d like to know more, we’ll 

patible graphics: 16 colors in 320x send you full information. Including 
200, and 4 colors in 640x200. That’s a free Hi-Res software compatibility 
two upgrades for the price of one. guide. Just call (800) 527-'7977, 

And no matter which monitor Ext 338, toll-free. From California, 

1>ad«fnarks: Paradise. Hi-Res C^phks Card- Paradise Sterns Inc.; Lotus I-2-3. SyniF^ny-Lotus Devetopment Cbrpcxation: 

Symphony, Framework-Ashlon-liile. Inc Registered trademark IBM-Intemational Business Machines 

CIRCLE 384 ON READER SERVICE CARD 





HOW TO CHECK THE BIOS 
VERSION OF YOUR EGA BOARD 


M ost of the differences among EGA 
boards are found In the BIOS, a 
program encoded in a ROM chip on each 
EGA board. Bugs that appear in an early 
version of the BIOS may be corrected by 
the manufacturer in later versions. 

Sometimes the ROM chip itself is la- 
beled with the version number. (It’s a 28- 
pin wide chip that is usually socketed in- 
stead of soldered to the boaM.) If the chip 
is not so labeled, you can usually check 
the BIOS version of an EGA board using 
DEBUG. Here’s how to do it. 

Install the EGA in a PC aixl boot up. 


Load DEBUG and execute the following 
DEBUG command: 

D C000:0 

The manufacturer’s copyright informa- 
tion, BIOS revision number, and possi- 
bly a date will usually appear at the right 
side of the screen. (Don’t be shocked if 
you see the letters “IBM” in there also.) 
If you don’t see anything that looks read- 
able, the copyright notice may be located 
later in the BIOS. Enter D a few more 
times until it shows up. Leave DEBUG 
by entering Q. — Charies PelzaM 


Attaching the EGA to an Enhanced 
Color Display offers another benefit. Al- 
though you'll only be able to use 16 colors 
at a time, those 16 can be selected from a 
palette of 64, The EGA also supports alter- 
native fonts and a 5 1 2-character set. Spe- 
cial programming can take advantage of 
soft scrolling, “horizontal pel (pixel) pan- 
ning” (shifting the display slightly to the 
left or right by less than a character width), 
and mdimentary windowing. (This issue’s 
Programming/Utilities column. “Explor- 
ing the EGA, Part I.” explores many fea- 
tures of the EGA.) 

REGISTER COMPATIBILITY On a 

hardware level, the EGA is programmed 
for a particular video mode by the contents 
of over 60 registers built into the board's 
video chips. These registers are pro- 
grammed through output ports. The set- 
tings of the registers control all the timing 
variables (such as the number of characters 
displayed on a line), allow different mem- 
ory mappings that duplicate the graphics 
modes of the Color/Graphics Adapter, and 
select the colors. 

Taking a cue from IBM, Chips and 
Technologies in its Enhanced Graphics 
CHIPSet has divided the main functions of 
the EGA among four large integrated cir- 
cuits. Different registers are associated 
with each of the four. A typical EGA board 
using the CHIPSet is shown in the accom- 
panying sidebar "Anatomy of an EGA 
Board.” 

In text modes, programs need not use 
these registers except to do esoteric things 
like soft scrolling (where text on the screen 
scrolls up or down by less than one charac- 
ter) or horizontal pel panning. However, in 
graphics modes, programming of the reg- 
isters is nearly a necessity. Unlike in the 
Color/Graphics Adapter, display memory 
in EGA graphics modes is not mapped di- 
rectly into the CPU memory. The manipu- 
lation of EGA registers gets the video data 
into the correct locations. 

For hardware compatibility. Chips and 
Technologies had to duplicate most of 
IBM’s EGA registers on its own chips so 
that identical programmed values cause 
identical results. Manufacturers of EGA 
boards using the CHIPSet have to wire the 
chips up correctly and build in some addi- 
tional register compatibility. Although 


Chips and Technologies provides a sample 
circuit design to implement a complete 
EGA board, most manufacturers design 
their own. 

THE AU^IMPORTANT BIOS Not all 

EGA boards that use the Chips and Tech- 
nologies Enhanced Graphics CHIPSet are 
created equal. Beyond hardware compati- 
bility. the individual manufacturers must 
also ensure software compatibility through 
a BIOS (Basic Input-Output System), 
which is a program encoded in a ROM 
chip on the EGA board. Older PCs with 
system BIOS dates earlier than 10/27/82 
will not recognize this EGA BIOS. This 
BIOS has three major functions: 

■ It initializes the EGA board by program- 
ming the registers when you first power up 
or reboot the PC and when a program 
changes video modes. 

■ It creates a high-level interface (through 
software Interrupt I Oh) for other programs 
to use the EGA. Many of the Interrupt lOh 
function calls are compatible with those on 
the system-board BIOS for the IBM 
Monochrome Adapter and Color/Graphics 
Adapter. 

■ It contains the fonts used for displaying 
characters on the display. The Mono- 
chrome and Color/Graphics Adapters use 
text-iTKxie fonts stored in a ROM on the 
video board, but the EGA has no on-board 
font. The font must be loaded from memo- 
ry into the board. 


The IBM EGA’s BIOS (and the BIOS’s 
of all the other carrls reviewed here) is 16K 
long. This is twice the size of the 8K sys- 
tem-board BIOS that serves for an entire 
PC or XT (excluding the hard-disk BIOS 
extension). However, the length of the 
EGA BIOS is a little deceptive, since over 
half of it is used for storing fonts, video pa- 
rameters. and other information. 

IBM’s BIOS is proprietary, and al- 
though a full listing is published in the 
EGA’s Technical R^erence manual, any 
company that attempted to put IBM’s on 
its own EGA boards would soon hear from 
IBM’s lawyers. Manufacturers must there- 
fore duplicate all the functions of IBM’s 
BIOS without directly duplicating any of 
the code. 

What makes this situation more inter- 
esting is the sorry state of IBM’s EGA 
BIOS. It contains several bugs and undoc- 
umented quirks compounded by errors in 
the EGA Technical Reference manual. 
These problems create a dilemma for EGA 
manufacturers. Should they attempt to cor- 
rect the bugs and release an EGA with a 
BIOS that is better than IBM’s? Or does 
compatibility with the IBM EGA standard 
mean duplicating IBM’s bugs — either ig- 
norantly or deliberately — under the as- 
sumption that applications software will 
adapt to these bugs and even rely on them? 

In general, the latter approach has pre- 
dominated. Too many programs already 
have become "EGA aware,” and one per- 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
148 


This wik of art 
is priced less 


Beauty and tBtdUSence 

Introducing SitfuEGAir a new 
high-resolution display adapter from 
Sigma Designs. It is a ff ue work of 
art for business gr^dtk s. Crisp text, 
sharp graphics, brilliant colors, pre- 
cise high resolution, aod the broadest 
compatibility of any CQlor graphics 
adaptor made. 

Art for the masses 

SigmaEGA! is uncQm monly 
compatible. No one drh cs more moni- 
tors,* color and monodii ome. No one 
can run more software lu ograms. And 
no one else can display IBM Enhanced 
Graphics (EGA), Color Graphics 
(CGA), .Monochrome Display and 
Hercules Graphics software as tnie 
to the original. 

Art from science? 

SigmaEGA! inoorpcu atcs Sigma 
Designs' own {aoneering CGA software 
emulation technique, the one that 
made our Color dOC" the standard for 
ultra-high resolution color graphics. 

It is this technique tha provides the 


CIRCLE 347 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


r SIGMA 
DESIGNS 


closest, most compatible emulation 
of all current display standards. 

And our ingenious design lets us 
make SigmaEGA! very small , very 
reliable, and exceptionally affordable. 

Unexpected flair 

And every SigmaEGA! includes 
PC Paintbrush for free form imaging. 


For a private show ing of 
SigmaEGA!. call 408/435-1480 or see 
your local Sigma Designs dealer. 

Sigma Designs 
2023 OTbole Avenue 
San Jose, CA 95131 
SigmaEGA! Functional, 
affordable art. 





Phi>u»itraph: Viiiono Sanm 


■ EGA STANDARD 



son's bug is someone else's feature. Being 
IBM-compatible has even meant that man- 
ufacturers must embed the letters "IBM" 
into the BIOS's of non-IBM boards (see 
sidebar "I'm IBM! Me Too! So Am 1!”). 

Unlike IBM, most of the manufacturers 
continually update their BIOS code — 
sometimes, it .seems, weekly or even dai- 
ly. In the feature summary table, I have in- 
dicated the version number of the BIOS in 
each board 1 tested. Everything in these re- 
views is based on those BIOS versions, 
and 1 have no knowledge of previous or 
later BIOS versions. If you have, or plan to 
buy, one of these boards, you may want to 
check the BIOS version yourself (see side- 
bar "How to Check the BIOS Version of 
Your EGA Board"). 

BEYOND COMPATIBIIJTV Early us- 
ers of the IBM EGA found that the board 
easily ran most software designed for the 
Color/Graphics Adapter (CGA) and 
Monochrome Adapter (often abbreviated 
as MDA for "Monochrome Display 
Adapter "). Unfortunately, "almost all" 
did not include the two software packages 
used most often to test IBM compatibility: 
Flight Simtilalor and 1-2-3, Release lA’s 
graphics. The 1-2-3 incompatibility (and 
Lotus’s long delay in developing new 
EGA drivers) was a serious problem and 
probably the factor that most inhibited im- 
mediate corporate acceptance of the IBM 
EGA board. 

The CGA and MDA both use the Mo- 
torola 6845 CRT Controller chip, but the 
IBM EGA does not. IBM's Technical Ref- 
erence documentation for the CGA slates 
that the Motorola 6845 CRT controller "is 
highly programmable with respect to raster 
and character parameters. Therefore, 
many additional modes are possible with 


From top to bottom: The IBM Enhanced 
Graphic.': Adapter ( with the Graphics 
Memory Expansion daughterboard I. 
Quadram's QuadEGA + . STB Systems’ EGA 
Plus. Genoa S\.':tems' Spectra EGA Mttdel 
4H00. AST Research ' SAST-3G Model I. NSI 
Logic’s EPIC Graphics Adapter Card, and 
Tecmar’s EGA Master. The extra space on a 
full-size EGA hoard allows the manufacturer 
to add a parallel port ora serial port, 
although not all manufacturers take 
advantage of the space and provide these 
e.xiras to the consumer. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
ISO 



FACT FILE 


Spectra EGA Modd 4800 

IBM Enhanced Graphics Adapter 

EnC Graphics Adaptn' Card 

C^noa Systems C(xp. 

IBM Corp. 

NSI Logic Inc. 

73 E. Trimble Rd. 

IOON.W.5ISt. 

Cedar Hill Business Pk. 

San Jose. CA9S131 

Boca Raton, FL 33432 

257-B Cedar Hill Rd. 

(408)945-9720 

List Price: Enhanced Graphics Adapter 

Marlboro. MA01752 

list Price: $599 

(64K). $524; Gravies Memory Expansion 

(617)4604)717 

In Short: Some simple EGA utility pro- 

Card (64K). $199; Graphics Memory Mod- 

List Price: 64K version. $495; 256K ver- 

grams may help you use this board with other 

uIeKit(l28K).$259 

sion. $595 

video adafNers. A printer port is standard. 

In ^mrt: IBM's board is costly and bulky. 

In Short: Although NSI’s EHC board lacks 

CIRCLE Cli ON READER SEffi/ICS CARO 

but those who will accept no substitute will 

some EGA functionality, nearly flawless 


somehow find the money. 

CGA emulation is built into its customized 

AST-3G Model 1 

CIRCLE t41 ON READER SERVICE CARO 

video hardware. 


CIRCLE S40 ON READER SERVICE CARO 

AST Research Inc. 

212) Alton Ave. 

EGA Plus 

EGA Master 

Irvine. CA 92714 

STB Systems Inc. 

Tecmarlnc. 

(714)863-1333 

601 N.Gleiiville.#l25 

6225 Cochran Rd. 

List Price: 64K version. $450; 256K ver- 

Richardson. TX 75081 

Solon. OH 44139-3377 

sion, $550; printer port. $25 

(214)234-8750 

(216)349-0600 

In Short: An optional printer poit is avail- 

List Price: $493 

List Price: $395 

able for this othowise straightforward EGA 

In Short: A printer port and optional clock/ 

In Short: Teemar's EGA Master combines 

board that mcorporates the Chips and Tech- 

calendar make this a versatile board. Its 

an excellent price with hi^ levels of com- 

nologieiCHlPSel. 

BIOS is one of the fastest. 

panMIity. wUle avoiding most BIOS bugs. 

CIRCLE cat ON READER SERVICE CARO 

CIRCLE tS7 ON READER SERVICE CARO 

CIRCLE as ON READER SERVICE CARO 





clever programming of the adapter.” 
Those who were inspired to do some clev- 
er programming did not feel so clever 
when the EGA was released. 

Although IBM went to great lengths to 
make the EGA mimic most of the opera- 
tions of the CGA and MDA. it did not pre- 
cisely duplicate the 6845 registers, the 
mode-control register, and the color-con- 
trol register ports present on the CGA and 
MDA boards. The most-useful CGA and 
6845 registers (the status port, the starting 
address, the cursor position, the cursor 
size, and the light-pen registers) are dupli- 
cated on the EGA, but little else is. I^ 
grams that set the video mode and colors 
through the BIOS usually run fine on the 
EGA. Those that do it directly (like 1-2-3, 
Release 1 A’s graphics and Flighi Simula- 
tor) throw the screen into chaos. 

Although software rarely manipulates 
the 6845 registers of the MDA, the EGA 
has another problem with the monochrome 
display because it interprets character attri- 
butes differently than the MDA does. 
Some programs use the same color attri- 
butes on the CGA and MDA because they 
usually look fine on both. On an EGA at- 
tached to a monochrome display, howev- 


er, many of them are not visible. (Both of 
these problems are clearly documented by 
IBM in the EGA Technical Reference.) 

One other video board has achieved 
enough widespread use to be classified as a 
standard: the Hercules Graphics Card. The 
Hercules card is capable of graphics reso- 
lution of 348 lines of 720 dots on a mono- 
chrome display. The Hercules also uses a 
6845 CRT Controller. Since IBM rarely 
acknowledges standards other than its 
own, the IBM EGA doesn't support the 
Hercules standard. 

Now, perhaps, you can understand why 
some programs cannot run on the EGA. 
Understanding is of little comfort, howev- 
er, if you or your company rely on one of 
those programs. To improve this situation, 
several EGA manufacturers have attempt- 
ed to implement CGA, MDA, and Hercu- 
les emulation together with EGA func- 
tions. 

THE PRODUCTS Now that we've ex- 
plored the terrain, let's take a quick look at 
each of the EGA boards. 

The IBM Enhanced Graphics Adapt- 
er comes with an installation manual, an 
upgrade of the diagnostics disk, and re- 


placement pages for your Guide to Opera- 
tions manual . The basic board has just 64K 
of memory, and a daughterboard called the 
Graphics Memory Expansion Card adds 
another 64K. The Graphics Memory Mod- 
ule Kit contains I28K worth of chips that 
plug into the Expansion Card. You need 
1 28K of memory to get 1 6 colors from the 
high-resolution mode 16 and for using a 
5 1 2-character set in text modes. 

IBM's EGA is bulkier than its competi- 
tors, mostly because it uses 16K by 4-bit 
memory chips instead of 64K by 4-bit 
chips. A fully loaded 256K-byte IBM 
EGA requires 32 memory chips while the 
other boards reviewed here provide the 
same memory with 8 chips. 

IBM's EGA includes a five-pin light- 
pen connector and a ‘‘feature connector” 
that permits access to many of the video 
and timing signals on the board. Two RCA 
jacks on the back of the board also connect 
to this feature connector but have no other 
function. 

Technical documentation for the IBM 
board (which includes schematic diagrams 
and a complete commented listing of the 
ROM BIOS) is also available, if you know 
the secret of how to get it (see sidebar “In 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
ISI 


■ EGA STANDARD 


Pursuit of the IBM EGA Technical Refer- 
ence.”) 

Software support for the EGA is in the 
form of IBM’s Graphics Development 
Toolkit ($495), which contains Virtual 
Device Interface (VDI) files loaded as 
CONFIG.SYS drivers and bindings for 
IBM's BASIC. PASCAL. C, and FOR- 
TRAN compilers (but noi for the BASIC 
interpreter). 

The NSI Logic’s EPIC Graphics 
Adapter Card is the only other EGA 
board (besides IBM’s) reviewed here that 
does not use the Chips and Technologies 
CHIPSet. Instead, it contains a large 1 Vz- 
inch-square VLSI (very large scale inte- 
gration) chip that handles most of the video 
logic. The strong point of this board is its 
near-flawless emulation of the IBM Color/ 
Graphics and Monochrome Adapters. 

While the EPIC manual is a 32-page 
low-budget affair, NSI also has a technical 


reference manual available for $39.95. It 
mostly duplicates information in the IBM 
manual, but it occasionally proviites more 
detail. A disk included with the board con- 
tains small programs (including assembly 
language source code) that switch the 
board to emulation modes. 

STB Systems’ EGA Plus adds a paral- 
lel printer port to a CHIPSet-based EGA 
implementation. An optional clock/calen- 
dar is also available. Both the video con- 
nector and the printer connector are 
mounted on the board’s rear bracket. Al- 
though most boards mount the DIP switch 
that controls the start-up video mode in the 
tear where you can access it from the back 
of your PC, STB puts it near the front of 
the board. (In most cases, however, you 
won’t be changing the switch settings very 
often.) 

Although the EGA Plus has a feature 
connector, it does not include the two 


RCA jacks on the IBM board. It’s not yet 
clear whether this lack will be a problem. 
The RCA jacks on the IBM EGA are con- 
nected only to the feature connector, and 
any feature later installed may have its own 
jacks. If you need a printer port, the fact 
that it’s mounted on the back of the board 
may be much more important to you than 
possible problems with "features” that 
don’t yet exist. 

The EGA Plus comes with the same PC 
Accelerator software included with many 
of the company’s other products. This 
disk, which includes RAMdisks, print 
buffers, and other utilities, has nothing to 
do with the EGA. 

Like the EGA Plus, Genoa Systems' 
Spectra EGA Model 4800 also includes a 
printer port mounted on the back along 
with the video connector. The DIP switch- 
es, however, are on the tear of the board at 
the top. so that you can change them by 
just sliding forward the cover of your PC 
an inch or so. Like the EGA Plus board, 
the Spectra does not include the two RCA 
jacks. Although it’s not documented, a 
four-pin connector on the Genoa board 
gives you access to the feature-connector 
signals that correspond to the RCA jacks. 

Genoa includes three programs to use 
with the Spectra EGA. One tells you if the 
board can be installed, based on the date of 
your system ROM. The other programs al- 
low you to change video modes and switch 
settings through software. You may have 
to change the video mode of your EGA to 
prevent memory conflicts with another 
board. For instance, if you also have a Her- 
cules Graphics Card installed, you must 
switch your EGA to one of the graphics 
modes that use segment AOOOh before you 
switch your Hercules card to the two-page 
mode. Unfortunately, the manual doesn’t 
explain this and instead tells you to switch 
to appropriate graphics modes before run- 
ning graphics programs. In my experi- 
ence, this is never necessary and even con- 
fuses many programs. 

The AST-3G Model 1 supports a paral- 
lel printer port available as an option. The 
back of the board contains the video con- 
nector, the RCA jacks, and access to the 
DIP switch. A cable with the printer con- 
nector attaches at one end to the board and 
either hangs out the back of your machine 
or mounts on a separate bracket in an ad- 


I’M ffiM! ME TOO! SO AM I! 

From our ‘ ‘Necessity Is the Mother of Invention’ ’ file 


O ne of the first programs to take ad- 
vantage of the IBM Enhanced 
Graphics Adapter was Microsoft Word, 
Version 2.0. However, the methrxl that 
Word 2.0 uses to detect the presence of 
an EGA is, in comparison with Word's 
more-advanced word processing fea- 
tures, uncharacteristically awkward. 
Word 2.0 looks at memory locations 
within the EGA BIOS to che^ if the let- 
ters “IBM” appear in the copyright no- 
tice. 

For manufacturers that must program 


a BIOS for an EGA compatible, this pre- 
sents a problem. If the letters “IBM” are 
not also embeckted in the BIOS, Word 
will think the EGA is actually a regular 
old CGA and will tun in white-on-black, 
640 by 2(X) resolution. 

All the EGA boards reviewed here 
have solved the problem; when they tun 
Microsoft Word, it thinks it's miming on 
an IBM EGA. How do you say “IBM” 
without saying that you’re IBM? Here 
are some examples of how the EGA 
compatibles do it. — Charles Petzold 


IBM Corp. : 24006277356 O COPYRIGHT IBM 1984 

AST Research ; IBM is nentioned for compatibility only 

NSI Logic : IBM EGA k CGA COMPATIBLE 

PC Designs ; O COPYRIGHT IBM Compatible EGA BIOS 

SigmaOeslgns: IBM EGA COMPATIBLE 

STB Systems : © COPYRIGHT 1986 STB ( ‘IBM a TM of IBM Corp . ) 
QuadramCo. : Note: Some code expects "IBM" here I 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
152 



640 x 350 16 COLOR 



FLIGHT SIMULATOR 



PAINT BRUSH 



Auto CAD 


NO 
MORE 


Low-End Graphics Adapters. 


Why Settle for Less? 



Graphics standard 


IBM sets the 
standards for 
Monochrome, 
Color /Graphics 
and the Enhanced 
Graphics Adapter 
He rcules sets the 
Monochrome 
And the 


MeifraGraph-Plus simply redefines the 
standard for what the Graphics Adapter 
is supposed to be: Monochrome text, 
Hercules graphics, color graphics, 
enhanced graphics. And most 
importantly ... No software driver 
patches required. 


Fully Compatible 

You can run almost all software from 
your early investment. Including Flight 
Simulator. Pin Ball, Jet and Lotus 1-2-3 
Version lA 

And it will still run all the business 
software packages written for IBM 
Enhanced Graphics Adapter (EGA). 
Examples include Auto CAD. IBM 
Drawing Assistant, Gem Draw, 
Microsoft Window, Word & Chart, Lotus 
1-2-3 and Symphony, Dr. Halo, PC Paint 
Brush, EGA-Paint and many, many 
more. 

ATVonics is dedicated to the technical 
excellence of computing devices, lb hnd 
out more about AlVonics and our super- 
high performance ATI-1000 & ATI 2000 
AT system compatible boards call or 
write: 



Features 


' Half size, fits in any slot of PC/XT/ AT 


✓ 



EGA compatible 

✓ 

✓ 

✓ 

✓ 

CGA compatible 

✓ 

(1) 

(2) 

(2) 

MDA compatible 

✓ 

✓ 

✓ 

/ 

Chip count 

24 

29 

86 

40 

Hercules compatible 720 x 348 graphics 

✓ 

✓ 



No Software Patches required 

✓ 


✓ 

✓ 

Boot from: 





— Flight Simulator 

✓ 




- Pin Ball 

✓ 




— Jet 

✓ 




Runs Lotus 1-2-3 version lA: 





— Hercules mode 

✓ 

(1) 



— Color mode 


(1) 



Two Video Jacks 

✓ 

✓ 

✓ 


Display Memory 

286K 

25eK 

64K 

256K 

Light Pen connector 


l/ 


✓ 


(1) Needs software driver patches. 

(2) Compatible only to the BIOS level, but not the hardware level Will not be compatible with most games software 

m 


AlVonics International Inc. 

491 Valley Way 
Milpitas. CA 95035 

(408) 943-6629 TLX: 510600-6093 CIRCLE ISb ON READER SERVICE CARD 




IBM, Hercules. Flight Simulator. Pin Ball, Jet. Lotus 1-2-3 Version 1A, Auto CAO, Gem Draw. Window, Word & Chart. Symphony Or Halo, PC Paint Brush. EGA Paint. 
Ouadram and STB EGA- are all registered trademarks of their respective companies 










The short cards, from left to right: Video-7' s VEGA. Tatung's TEGA-22. Sigma Designs' SigmaEGAI. Quadram' s QuadEGA + . the PC Designs 
Enhanced Graphics Adapter, and ATronics' MegaGraph Plus. The Chips and Technologies Enhanced Graphics CHIPSet enables 
manufacturers to squeeze all the display capabilities of a full-size EGA board onto a convenient half-size card. 


joining slot in the machine. 

AST Research includes an IBM-like di- 
agnostics program (with a walk-through in 
the manual) and a demonstration disk by 
Zenographics. This demo program actual- 
ly turns out to be an advertisement for oth- 
er AST products, but it’s very attractive. 

Tecmar's EGA Master supports an op- 
tional serial port. While serial ports are 
most often used for modems (and some 


printers), the manual suggests using it for a 
mouse. This is an excellent idea and makes 
the Tecmar a good one-slot "Windows 
board." 

Like the AST-3G, the Tecmar EGA 
Master has its video connector, RCA 
jacks, and DIP switches at the tear and 
runs a cable to another bracket for the seri- 
al port. Although the AST-3G and EGA 
Master both use a BIOS created by Inter- 


link Business Network, the boards are not 
the same. 

THE SHORT LIST The remaining six 
EGA boards are on 5-inch half-slot cards. 
In operation, the short cards tend to get 
hotter than full-length boards, but they are 
teal marvels to look at. (Quadram and Vid- 
eo-? sell both long and short versions of 
their EGA boards.) These six boards can 


03 

bAq fact file 




MegaGraph Plus 

PC Designs Enhanced Graphics Adapter 

QuadEGA+ 



ATronics Internationa] Inc. (ATI) 

PC Designs Inc. 

(^adramCo. 



491 Valley Way. Bldg. 1 

11105-B E. 56th St. 

One Quad Way 



Milpitas. CA9503S 

Tulsa. OK 74146 

Norcross, GA 30093-2919 



(408)943*6629 

(918)252-5550 

(404)923-6666 



List Price: SS49 

List Price: $299 

List Price: $595 



In Short: The "Plus" in MegaCjraph Plus 

In Short: PC Designs has placed an unbe- 

In Short: Quadram is selling Video-7's 



means that CGA and HGC emulation have 

lievably low price on its version of ATrcmics 

VEGA board with the same CGA and Heicu- 



been included in the BIOS. That’s good fn* 

MegaGraph (no Plus), but some BIOS and 

les software emul^on. This is a fine board 



bootable softwve. but it doesn't always 

hardware problems will plague those who 

with a few minor problems that Video-7 is 



work. The boot message will be a nuisance if 

want full EGA functionality. 

fixing. 



you don't use die emulation. 

CIRCLE 834 ON READER SERVICE CARO 

CIRCLE 831 ON READER SERVICE CARO 



anCLE eaa ON READER SERVICE CARO 






TEGA-22 





Tuung Co. of America 

VEGA 



S^maEGA! 

2850 El Presidio St. 

Video-7 Inc. 



Sigma Designs 

Long Beach. CA 90810 

550 Sycamore Dr. 



2023OTooleAve. 

(213)637-2105 

Milpitas. CA 95035 



San Jose. CA 95131 

List Price: $599 

(800)238-0101 



(408)435-1480 

In Short: The TEGA'22 is Sigma Designs' 

List Price: $599 



UstPrke: S595 

board, but the BIOS version tested here had 

In Short: The VEGA is a good choice If you 



In Short: A very low bug lewl makes this 

too many bugs. TEGA-22 boards with later 

require simple CGA and Hercules software 



board stand out. Hercules software emulatkm 

BIOS versions should work as well as the 

emulation on top of a good EGA implemen- 



is standard. 

SigmaEGA!. 

union. 



ORCLE ns ON READER SERVICE CARO 

CIRCLE «» ON READER SERVICE CARO 

CIRCLE 830 ON READER SERVICE CARO 









PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
154 


FTKKograph: VinorioSanor 


The most complete EGA adapter on the market 


COME ON 



ASK US 
YOUR 
TOUGHEST 
QUESTIONS! 

EPIC is the EGA adopter with the answers yeu need. 


what does EPIC do that 
other adapters don't? 

It runs all EGA, CGA and MDA 
software. 

Big deal. Lots of adapters say 
they can do that. 

Not exactly. You have to read 
those ads carefully. They don’t say 
“all”. They say “several”, “virtually 
all” and “97%”. 

That’s pretty close. 

It’s not close enough if you have a 
single important program that won’t 
run with those other boards. Then 
you’ll have a computer with an 
expensive color adapter that can’t 
perform your basic tasks. 

And EPIC? 

EPIC runs them all. 100% of the 
hundreds of CGA programs in 
existence, as well as all EGA and 


MDA programs. 

Don't all graphics adapters 
work the same? 

Not by a long shot. EPIC is 
based on an NSl proprietary chip, 
precisely mated to PC architecture. 
It has the same configuration as 
EGA, CGA and MDA native 
adapters— not a patchon that 
“emulates” them. 

Why is that so important? 

It means that EPIC can handle 
high speed programs that send 
instructions right to the hardware, 
as well as those that run through 
the BIOS. It means that every time 
you turn on your computer and 
load a program, it’s guaranteed to 
run. It needs no new drivers or 
anything else. 

Next question, please . . . 


EPIC delivers what other 
adapters only talk about— 
full three-inK>ne adapter 
compatibility. An outstanding 
value at $595.00. 

For orders or dealer 
nearest you, call: 
1 - 800 - 772 - 3742 . 

(In Mass, call 617460.0717.) 



NSl Logic Inc. 

257-B Cedar Hill Road, Marlboro, MA 
01752 (617) 4604717 


Dealer and distributor inquiries invited. 


lYademarksfowners: IBM. PC. PC/XT. PC/AT/IBM Coqi. EPIC is a trademark of NSl Inc. 


■ EGA STANDARD 


TTu] EGA Benchmark Tests 

\ - I Teletype 
r=:^ Teletype 
8^ w. scroll 

0 5 10 15 20 


EPtC Graphics 
Ad^erCard 

MegaGraph 

Phis 


AST-3G 
1 


PC Designs 
EGA 


Spectra EGA 
Model 4800 

Sigma EGA! 


OuadEGA 

Plus 


i 


88 

1 

14.6 


1 

1 

85 

1 

14,3 


1 

■ ) 

66 


14 1 


1 

1 

73 

1 

14.1 


1 


8 1 


1 


13.7 



1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 > 1 : 1 1 


10 


20 


The EGA BiOS Routine wWiout Scrolling benchmark 
test measures the speed of the BIOS T^ype routine with- 
out scrolling. The test is performed m video mode 3. The 
screen s deared and 24 knes of 60 characters each 
(including a terminating carnage return and line feed) are 
written to the display through the BIOS letetype routine 
Th« Is done 10 tmes. The times shown are m seconds. 
The EGA BIOS Routine with Scrolling berxtimark test 
measures the speed of the BIOS 'teleiype routine with 
scMvig The test is performed in video mode 3. The 
screen ts cleared and 240 hrtes of GO characters each 
(mcfudng a terminating carnage return and kne feed) are 
written to the display tfvough the BIOS T^lype routine. 
Although the first 24 hnes writ ten to the dispi^ do not 
involve scrolling, at the remaining lines saoN Ihe display 
The tunes showm are m secorxls 


be divided into three pairs: in each pair, 
one company is selling, under its own 
name, the board manufactured by the oth- 
er. To make things more interesting, how- 
ever. these boards all arrived at PC Maga- 
zine with slightly different BIOS versions, 
and so in some cases the boards that look 
identical function the same, and in other 
cases they function a little differently. 

The ATronics International Mega- 
Graph Plus and the PC Designs En- 
hanced Graphics Adapter look the same, 
but the PC Designs EGA I tested was actu- 
ally a version of Ihe MegaGraph (without 
Ihe Plus). The MegaGraph Plus can emu- 
late the Color/Graphics Adapter and the 
Hercules Graphics Card; the plain Mega- 
graph — and, hence, the PC Designs 
EGA — cannot. PC Designs says it will be- 
gin selling Ihe Plus version as soon as pos- 
sible. 

Sigma Designs' SigmaEGA! is also 
sold by Tatung under the name TEGA-22. 
Both these boards come with software to 
emulate the Hercules Graphics Card. The 
SigmaEGA! is a little bulkier than the Vid- 
eo-? VEGA and ATronics MegaGraph 
Plus and even uses a tiny daughterboard 
for the ROM BIOS. The ROM is soldered, 
but Ihe daughterboard is removable. The 
boards come with software to switch to 
Hercules Graphics Card emulation. Sig- 
ma's board includes Z-Soft's PC Paint- 
brush program, which supports the EGA, 

The Sigma and Tatung manuals say that 
PCs and XTs with system ROM dates of 
“10/27/82 or earlier" will need replacing. 
This is not true. The 10/27/82 PC ROM is 
fine; it is in fact Ihe latest ROM available 
for the PC. If you wait for IBM to release a 
PC ROM with a date later than 10/27/82, 
you will be waiting a very long time. 

The Video-7 VEGA and Quadram 
QuadEGA-H boards and manuals are 
identical except for the names. The manual 
is very good and covers both the short and 
long versions of these boards. A separate 
reference card summarizes DIP switch set- 
tings. Emulation software for the CGA 
and HGC comes on a disk. 

All the other boards imitate IBM by in- 
cluding a jumper to indicate if an En- 
hanced Color Display is attached to the 
EGA. The VEGA and QuadEGA-l- 
boards instead have a toggle switch acces- 
sible from the back of the board. This 


switch will be a big help if you'll be fre- 
quently switching the monitor on your 
EGA, but putting this function on a toggle 
switch is generally not a good idea. A tog- 
gle can be too easily switched from one po- 
sition to another. Getting this switch 
wrong can cause problems with a mono- 
chrome display, such as smoke pouring 
out of your monitor. 

The Video-7/Quadram short board is 
the only one that includes a jumper for in- 
stallation in slot 8 of a PC-XT. 

VAWATIONSONATHEME The EGA 
boards reviewed here worked well. I tested 
each on both an IBM Enhanced Color Dis- 
play and an IBM Monochrome Display 
with Microsoft Window’s, 1-2-3, Release 
I A (with the more recent EGA drivers), 
Microsoft Word, Version 2.0, and IBM's 
Virtual Device Interface (VDI) package. I 
also ran the boards through my own test 
program that checked BIOS functions and 
register compatibility. I looked at how the 
non-IBM boards dealt with some IBM 
BIOS bugs and quirks and with some of 
the more esoteric features of the EGA. 
This testing procedure was not an attempt 
to search out obscure features, but rather to 
determine if any of these boards will have 
problems with future software that takes 
full advantage of the IBM EGA. My find- 
ings fell under several main headings (the 
accompanying table, "EGA Boards: 
BIOS Performance," summarizes the re- 
.sults for each board). 

■ Reboot on IBM PC. Owners of PCs (but 
not XTs or ATs) will notice a big differ- 
ence in how a Ctrl-Alt-Del command 
works after an IBM EGA has been in- 
stalled. In short, the initialization in the 
EGA BIOS destroys a register that the PC 
system board BIOS later uses to skip over 
the long memory checks during a three- 
key reboot. The EGA BIOS seems to be 
using this register to return an error code, 
yet the PC. XT, and AT do not check for 
this error code. 

The AST-3G, STB EGA Plus, and 
Tecmar EGA Master are the only boards 
that do not change this regi,ster. PCs with 
these hoards boot up immediately after a 
Ctrl-Alt-Del, (A member of AST's techni- 
cal staff told me that AST's BIOS changes 
the register only if an error occurs during 
the initialization procedure. I suspect this 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
156 


is a good compromise.) 

■ Teletype scroll calls. On the DOS com- 
mand level, and in most programs that use 
simple line-by-line output (such as DE- 
BUG), DOS uses the BIOS teletype rou- 
tine to display characters to the screen. 
This routine in the BIOS is responsible for 
moving the cursor, writing the character to 
the screen, and scrolling if necessary. 

The speed of this teletype routine de- 
pends somewhat on the type of function 
calls the BIOS uses. To perform each tele- 
type function, the BIOS in some boards 
uses additional Interrupt lOh function calls 
(1 term these “re-entrant”) and others use 
“internal” calls. You’ll get a feel for the 


implications of these differences from the 
PC Magazine Labs benchmark tests, 
which show results of speed tests that use 
the BIOS teletype routine. BIOS routines 
that use internal calls generally have faster 
teletype response than those that use re-en- 
trant calls. (See “EGA Benchmark 
Tests.”) 

There’s a penalty for the faster method 
if you use a screen-recall utility like my 
WAITASEC program (see “WAITASEC 
While I Get That,” PC Magazine, Vol- 
ume 4 Number 24, page 215). People who 
use screen-recall programs often become 
addicted to them. These programs, which 
work by intercepting BIOS “scroll-up” 


not run with the SigmaEGAI, Tatung 
TEGA-22, Quadram QuadEGA + , and 
Video-7 VEGA boards. 

STB engineers were well aware of the 
potential conflict with screen-recall pro- 
grams and made an excellent compromise. 
STB’s BIOS uses internal calls for every- 
thing except scrolling. This technique, 
plus some generally tight coding, allowed 
the EGA Plus to come near the top in these 
time tests. 

I also tested the speed of each board 
when directly writing to display memory 
in text mode 3 and EGA graphics mode 
16. For the EGA graphics modes, one rou- 
tine wrote blocks to the screen (a memory- 


Some of the differences among the workings of the EGA BIOS are shown below. Refer to the article for an explanation of each column . 



EGA Boards: BIOS Performance 


Reboot 00 
IBM PC 


Teletype 
scroll calls 


No. ol characters in 
same loot as IBM 
BxB 14xB 


Fonl-chaoBe proMems 
Monochrome ECD 
underline cursor 


Automatic loot set 
on mode change 


IBM Enhanced Graphics Adapter 

IBM Corp. 

Long 

Re-entrant 

256 

256 

Gone 

Gone 

Wrong no. of lines, no 
cursor on ECD 

EPIC Graphics Adapter Card 

NSI Logic 

Long 

Re-entrant 

256 

253 

Gone 

Gone 

No cursor on ECD 

AST-3G Modei 1 

AST Research 

Short 

Re-entrant 

239 

251 

Gone 

Gone 

Blanks out 

Spectra EGA Model 4800 

Genoa Systems Corp. 

Long 

Re-entrant 

256 

256 

Gone 

Gone 

Blanks out and crashes 

EGA Plus 

STB Systems 

Short 

Re-entrant 

92 

94 

Gone 

Gone 

Unreadable font, 
sometimes crashes 

EGA Master 

Lii9 Tecmar 

Short 

Re-entrant 

239 

251 

Gone 

Gone 

Blanks out 

MegaGraph Plus 

ATronics International 

Long 

Re-entrant 

256 

256 

Gone 

Gone 

Wrong no. of lines, no 
cursor on ECD 

PC Designs Enhanced Graphics Adapter 

PC Designs 

Long 

Re-entrant 

256 

256 

Gone 

Gone 

Wrong no. of lines, no 
cursor on ECO 

SigmaEGA! 

Sigma Designs 

Long 

internal 

256 

256 

Gone 

Gone 

No cursor on ECD 

TEGA-22 

Tatung Co. of America 

Long 

Internal 

256 

256 

Gone 

Gone 

No cursor on ECD 

QuadEGA+ 

Quadram Co. 

Long ^ 

Internal 

256 

255 

Gone 

Gone (except 

If 25 lines) 

No cursor on ECD 

VEGA 

Video-7 

Long 

Internal 

256 

255 

Gone 

Gone (except 
if 25 lines) 

No cursor on ECD 




PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1985 
157 



Average Rainfall 
Inches Per Year 


Plantronics Mode 


EGA Mode 


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lA (and some current 
versions too) won’t work with 
the EGA standard. That’s a 
problem because in the 
course of your workday youll 
need to use software written 
for different video modes. 

Paradise has the answer. 
The Paradise AutoSwitch 


EGA works with every pop- 
ular PC video mode. And 
is smart enough to switch to 
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you change programs. 
Automatically. 

AutoSwitch. 

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The Paradise AutoSwitch 
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automatically to work with 
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to run. On RGB monitors it 
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modes; on monochrome 


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Hercules modes. The 
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runs any PC software you 
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Automatically. That’s some- 
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Runs all EGA, CGA, MDA 
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True hardware compatibility 
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the Paradise AutoSwitch EGA 
runs EGA software, it’s an 
EGA card; when it runs IBM 
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mns Hercules software, it’s 
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EGA with true 6845 hard- 
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Paradise’s exclusive Auto- 
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■ EGA STANDARD 


ANATOMY OF AN EGA BOARD 


P acking all the functions of an En- 
hanced Graphics Adapter onto a 5- 
inch card hardly seems possible, yet the 
Video-7 VEGA board inakes it look easy 
and even beautiful. Most of the woik is 
done by the four-chip Chips and Tech- 
nologies Enhanced Graphics CHIPSet 
(the chips numbered 82C43 j[). Program- 
mable logic arrays and surface-mount 
technology also help to keep the size 
down. 


1. The 82C431 Graphics CoatroUer 
controls the transfer of data between the 
video memory anc^ the CPU when a pro- 
gram is writing or reading to the adapter, 
and from the video memory to the Attri- 
butes Controller for the display of text or 
graphics. 

2. The Feature Connector provides ex- 
ternal devices with access to many of the 
board’s important timing and output sig- 
nals and substitutes the device’s own vid- 


eo signals for those generated on the 
board. 

3. The 82C433 Attrihutes Controller 
controls the tiuqiping of the 16 color attri- 
butes to the 64 possible EGA colors 
while generating the final signals sent to 
the video display. 

4. The 82C432 Sequencer generates 
signals for controlling memory accesses. 

5. The 16.257-MIIz crystal generates 
the dot clock and other timings for all 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
160 



EGA video inodes that use 3S0 scan 
lines. The 14-MHz dot clock for 200 
scan-line video inodes come fiom die PC 
system bus. This clock determines the 
rate at which individual dot signals are 
sent to the display. 

6. On most boai^, the monitor type is 
selected by a jumper connection, but the 
Video-7 board uses a toggle switch. One 
position qiecifies that an Enhanced Color 
Display is attached to the board; the ocher 
position indicates a Color/Graphics or 
Monochrome display. 

7. The DIP swit^ settings tell the BIOS 
what type of monitor is attached, whether 
the EGA is primary or secondary, and 
what video mode should be in effect dur- 
ing power up. 

8. The ROM BIOS does not direcdy 
control anything on the board. It initial- 
izes the board during booting, provides a 
medium-level programming interface to 
board functions, and contains fonts that 
are loaded into memory for text modes. 

9. The two RCA jacks are attached only 
to the feature connecto' and have no di- 
rect function on the board. 

10. The Light Pen Connector is com- 
patible with that on the CGA board. 

11. The monitor is attached to this Video 
Output Connector. 

12. Other integrated circuits provide 
an interface between the system bus and 
the video chips. 

13. The 82C434 CRT Controller gen- 
erates most of the synchronization tim- 
ings for the video display. Registers on 
this chip control the number of characters 
per line, the number of lines per screen, 
the number of scan lines, and the cursor 
position. 

14. Each chip in the display memory 
stores 64K four-bit values for a total of 
2S6K bytes. In graphics modes, each of 
the four groups of 64K bytes stores the 
dot patterns for a particular color plane. 
In text modes, the memory stores the AS- 
CII character codes, the attribute (or col- 
or) codes, and up to four different fonts 
with dot patterns for 2S6 characters each . 


intensive operation) and another wrote 
lines to the screen (which involves fre- 
quent register manipulation). These three 
tests are not shown in the benchmark 
graphs because all the boards ran them at 
the same speed except for NSl’s EPIC 
board, which was 5 to 15 percent faster 
than all the others. 

■ Number of characters in same font as 
IBM. The IBM EGA’s BIOS contains dot 
patterns for each available screen font. 
Most boards use IBM’s fonts or something 
very close, except for the EGA Plus. In the 
table, the columns under the heading “No. 
of characters in same font as IBM’’ com- 
pare each EGA font with IBM’s. 

The EGA BIOS includes a routine to 
load a user-defined font. This BIOS call 
also allows you to change the number of 
lines displayed on the screen. For instance, 
the normal text mode characters when the 
EGA is connected to an Enhanced Color or 
Monochrome Display have 14 scan lines. 
You can use the 8-scan-line character set to 
get 43 lines instead of 25. 

■ Font-change problems. Unfortunately, 
the IBM BIOS has some bugs in the font- 
loading routines. One of these affects the 
underline attribute when you use the BIOS 
to change the font on the Monochrome 
Display. All the non-IBM EGA boards du- 
plicate IBM’s bug by making the underline 
disappear. 

When an Enhanced Color Display is at- 
tached to the IBM EGA, this same BIOS 
call causes the cursor to disappear. All the 
other EGA boards do the same except the 
QuadEGA4- and the VEGA, which pre- 
serve the cursor if you’re retaining 25- 
character lines on the screen. The problem 
with the IBM BIOS relates to a need for 
“cursor size emulation” on the Enhanced 
Color Display. Many programs assume 
that each character has 8 scan lines when 
setting the shape and size of the cursor, so 
the IBM EGA BIOS has to adjust for the 
actual 14 scan lines. However, it makes 
this adjustment based not on the character 
font that’s loaded but simply on whether an 
IBM Enhanced Color Display is attached. 
This problem is compounded during font 
loading. 

■ Automatic font set on mode change. 
The IBM EGA BIOS has a facility to auto- 
matically load a font during a video-mode 
change. The BIOS uses pointers set in 


lower memory to address this font. This is 
a nice feature, but it has not been well im- 
plemented. IBM’s BIOS loads the font, 
but it doesn’t correctly calculate the num- 
ber of lines that appear on the screen, 
which causes problems with teletype out- 
put. The ATionics and the PC Designs 
boards duplicate IBM’s bug. The AST, 
Genoa, STB, and Tecmar boards don’t 
work at all with this facility. 

MORE PROBLEMS Some EGA 
boards include a few of their own bugs as 
well as those duplicated (or expanded 
upon) from IBM’s board. 

■ Some EGA boards 
include their own bugs as 
well as those duplicated 
from IBM’s boards. 

EGA-standard boards are capable of 
using a 512-character set in text mode by 
storing two fonts of 256 characters each. 
The bit in the video attribute that normally 
defines high intensity is used instead for 
selecting between the two fonts; this has 
applications in bilingual word processors. 
All of the boards handled the 512-charac- 
ter set except the PC Designs EGA and 
ATronics MegaGraph Plus. In fact, these 
boards would not even correctly mn a sam- 
ple program IBM included in its EGA 
Technical Reference manual to illustrate 
the 512-character set! (Following my test- 
ing, ATronics sent us a revised Mega- 
Graph Plus board that corrected the 512- 
character set problem.) 

The PC Ctesigns EGA board had prob- 
lems with the BIOS Load Font routines, in 
which some register recalculations are per- 
formed. No matter what I told it, it always 
loaded the 8 by 8 font. When displayed, 
the bottom part of each character still con- 
tained whatever happened to be in memory 
prior to the load. A later version of the 
same BIOS in the MegaGraph Plus did it 
right. 

(After testing had been completed, PC 
Designs sent us a new board with the 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1985 
161 







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Unbeatable software compatibility 
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L<x)king for PC graphics.^ Now it's easy 
to decide which card to buy: 

VEGA’rthe Vidco-7 Enhanced Graphics Adapter 
for the IBM PC family, is a terrific way to ensure 
your PC "software growth path" for the present 
ami the future. V£C» A won't lock you into a soft* 
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vantage of the exciting programs being developed 
for the new 256K IBM EGA standard — and still 
run software written for^// of today's popular 
IBM video standards. 

You save slot space and money. And you 
get great features only VEGA can offer. 

VEGA lets you switch between enhanced color, 
color or monochrome displays using an external 
switch selector, so you never have to remove your 
PC’s cover. 

VEGA's short-slot design fits in any slot of your 
IBM PC. XT.^AT"* or most PC compatibles— 
including slot 8 of the PC/XT. You get more flexi- 


bility and room for adding other functions to 
your system. 

VEGA uses advanced surface* mounted CMOS 
VLSI technology for high speed, compact size, 
low power consumption and high reliability. 

VEGA costs about half as much as IBM's EGA 
adapter with full 256K RAM. And it gives you 
more functionality at a better price than any 
combination of the cards it replaces. 

Video-7 is one of the leading designers 
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better job. Hold it in your hand: You'll fttl the 
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Call 1-800-238-0101 (in CA; 800-962-5700) 
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■ EGA STANDARD 


ATronics hardware but using a BIOS 
copyrighted by Quintessential Consultants 
Inc. (QCI) and dated 4/15/86. This new 
BIOS did not exhibit the problems I found 
in the earlier board. However, the new PC 
Designs board sometimes left random 
lines on the screen when the BIOS scrolled 
text in a graphics mode.) 

The Tatung TEGA-22's BIOS Write 
Dot routine made the screen go crazy in 
EGA graphics mode. This is not as serious 
a problem as it may seem. Virtually all 
graphics programs avoid the BIOS Write 
Dot routine (it is excruciatingly slow) and 
instead write directly to the screen. The 
TEGA-22 handled graphics fine when 
writing directly to the screen; only the 
BIOS routine was faulty. The Write Dot 
routine in the later version of the same 
BIOS on the SigmaEGA! board worked 
fine, but the Read Dot routine didn’t work. 

The Tatung board also used different 
logic for the Write String BIOS routine 
where characters and attributes alternate. 
IBM’s logic requires that no attributes fol- 
low control characters such as carriage re- 
turns or line feeds. Tatung’s logic assumes 
attributes are present and skips over them. 
Tatung’s approach is actually easier to use 
(from a programming perspective), but 
that’s too bad. Again, the later BIOS revi- 
sion in the SigmaEGA! worked correctly 
(that is, like the IBM EGA). 

Software may program the EGA board 
to generate the hardware interrupt IRQ2 
(corresponding to Interrupt OAh on the 
software level) at the beginning of a verti- 
cal retrace. In updates to the PC and XT 
Technical Reference manuals, IBM classi- 
fies IRQ2 as specifically the “EGA inter- 
rupt," although other hardware, like the 
Microsoft Mouse, uses it too. All the non- 
IBM EGA boards handled this interrupt 
well except for the Quadram (JuadEGA-t- 
and the Video-7 VEGA, which generated 
the interrupt but reversed the bit in the sta- 
tus port, "rhese two boards act in accor- 
dance with IBM's documentation, but not 
in accordance with IBM’s (and everyone 
else’s) implementation. 

The QuadEGA-b and VEGA do some 
other strange things besides. If these 
BIOS’s encounter a problem during boot- 
ing, they will store an error code down in 
lower memory in a place reserved for the 
expansion memory size. On a PC (but not 


XT or AT), this code will cause your sys- 
tem to believe it has run out of memory 
prematurely, perhaps even before your 
CONFIG.SYS file gets done. (Following 
my testing, Video-7 sent us another 
VEGA board labeled Revision 3 with a 
BIOS version of 1 ,052 that corrected the 
vertical interrupt status bit, allowed a PC to 
boot up immediately after a Ctrl-Alt-Del, 
didn't save an error code in the BIOS data 
area, and used re-entrant calls in the BIOS 
teletype routine. This latter change caused 
the new VEGA board to register the slow- 
est response in the teletype speed tests of 
all the boards except the NSI EPIC, prov- 
ing once again that you really can’t have it 
all.) 

I’ll have some good things to say about 
NSI’s EPIC board when I discuss CGA 
emulation. However, the EPIC’s EGA im- 
plementation is, quite simply, not as good 
as those of the boards that use the C^ips 
and Technologies CHlPSet. 

If you use the NSI EPIC with a mono- 
chrome display, you will notice almost im- 
mediately that the line and block drawing 
characters (character codes COh through 
DFh) do not connect on the horizontal. 
The IBM and Chips and Technologies chip 
sets toll over the eighth dot for these char- 
acters in the monochrome’s 14- by 9-char- 
acterbox. NSI’sdoes not. Solid horizontal 
lines from the IBM Monochrome Adapter 
become dashed lines on the EPIC. 

The video parameters used by the NSI 
EPIC differ in a few values from those in 
the IBM and Chips and Technologies 
EGA implementations. These differences 
are not documented in NSI’s technical ref- 
erence manual and may cause ptxrblems 
for programs that must load registers. 

EPIC’S vertical retrace signal goes high 
after the vertical retrace has completed, 
which may cause some black line static at 
the top of your screen during a palette 
change. During horizontal pel panning in 
text modes, the right-most column of char- 
acters has incorrect color attributes. Using 
split screens in text mode doesn’t work un- 
less everything is on a character boundary. 
The IBM board and all the boards that used 
the Chips and Technologies CHIPSet had 
no problem with these tasks. 

Are these just minor defects in NSI’s 
EGA implementation? Probably — unless, 
of course, you want to use these features. 


SIX VIEWS 
OF WINDOWS 

When you put them up on 
the screen and compare all 
of them together, 
the differences between one 
combination of hardware 
and another are dramatic. 

T he six screen images here illustrate 
improvements you can expect if you 
upgrade to a video adapter widi the reso- 
lution and color capability of the IBM 
Enhanced Graphics Adapter. We chose 
Microsoft Windows to dramatize the dif- 
ferences among the display adapter/mon- 
itor combinations because of its layered 
graphics and vivid use of coIch', Windows 
costs only $99, but if you buy it you may 
also want to invest in a hardware upgrade 
to take advantage of these features. 

In each screen image, the window at 
the left was created in Micrografx’s Win- 
dows Draw!, one of the first available in- 
dependently released Windows applica- 
tions. The upper-right’-hand corner 
shows a document created in Windows 
Write (an application that conies with 
Windows). 'Ihe lower-right-hand comer 
shows an unfolded “color cube” special- 
ly programmed for this demonstration. 
-—Charles PetzoM 


Top right: This is what Windows looks like on 
an IBM Monochrome Adapter and Display. 
Windows uses gngthics, and the Monochrome 
Adapter cannot do graphics. The Monochrome 
Adapter once served us well, but now it's got to 
go. What can you do with your old Mono 
board? Wouldn'titbefuntobreakitinha^ 

Bottom right: A Hercules Graphics Card 
attached to a monochrome display helps out. 
The resolution (348 lines of 720 dots each) is 
fine, but the only colors you get are green and 
black. That’s acceptable ifyou already have a 
Hercules card, but it doesn’t exactly make your 
jaw drop, does it? 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
164 




I 



Draii - DRI1U\PCIIflG.PIC 


Dnte - IIUSINGS.OOC 


File Edit Drai) uptions viev Line 
Pattern Text 


me tait search Character Paragraph 
Docunent 


A system such ss Microsofts Windows 

with Its ''Grsphics Device Interlace* 
allows software developers to write 
programs without worrying about 
supporting many different types of video 
adapters. However, video adapters wiN 
eorttinue to play a significant role in 
personal computers as they improve in 
resolution and color capabilities * 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
165 


Copyrighted malarial 










When it comes to a portable 
computer; smaller is better. 

Thafs one reason the new dual 
disk drive TbstubaTllOO PLUS has it all 
over the IBM PC Convertible! 

But our new portable PC is not 
only smaller than the IBM. Ifs also 
lighter And more powerful. 

How mudi smaller? A full 20%. 
And theirs weighs 12.2 pounds. Ours 
is under 10 pounds. 

And with the IBM portable 
computer, if you want seri^ and paral- 
lel ports or a CRT port, you have to 
ado add-ons. Whicn makes it even big- 
ger and heavier. And more expensive. 

With IheTllOO PLUS, the serial, 
the parallel and the CRT ports are 
standard built-in features. Simple math- 
ematics tells you vdiich portable is more 
portable. And more affordable. 

WE TAKE THE PORTABLE PC TO 
A HIGHER POWER 

Before we go any further, we 
have to tell you there is one thing about 
the TllOO PLUS that’s bigger than the 
IBM portable. Its maximum memory 
capacity. Ours is 640K of RAM. Theirs 
is only 512K of RAM. 

Now we can tell you that the 
TLIOO PLUS is f^ter than the IBM. 
Our 80C86 microprocessor lets you zip 
through work at up to twice the speed. 

ANOTHER CLEAR ADVANTAGE. 

The Tbshite TLLOO PUJS uses 
a hi^-contrast hi^-resolution LCD 
dispay screea It ^ows 25 lines by 80 
dimeters of text with 640x200 reso- 
lution, tilts to any convenient viewing 
an^ and folds flat when you use a 
CICT monitor 

The IBM portable also uses an 
LCD display screen. But it doesn’t have 

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as much contrast It doesn’t tilt to as 
many convenient angles. And you have 
to pml it off to hook up another monitor. 

ONE MORE THING THAT MAKES 
US EXCEPTIONAL. 

Of course, the Toshiba TllOO 
PLUS is fully IBM-compatible. So you 
can run popular software like Lotus 
1-2-3' WorrotaP and dBASE Hi! 

And, as we mentioned, it has 
two built-in 720K 3.5"disk dnves. It 
also has an optional 1200-baud Hayes'- 
compatible internal modem and runs 
on built-in rechargeable batteries. Just 
like the IBM portable. 

But should either stop running, 
only Toshiba guarantees you overnight 
delivery of a replacement while your 
TllOO PLUS is being fixed. Ifs ^ part 
of our “Exceptional Care” program. 

To find out more about the 
TllOO PLUS, call 1-800-457-7777 for 
the name of the Toshiba dealer near 
you. And see why being small is 
going to make us one of the biggest 
names in PCs. 

In Ibuch with Tomorrow 

TOSHIBA 

_ lushfiBAnvnca. Inc. information Sy^tUmsOivisinn 



■ EGA STANDARD 



File Efiit Drae Options Oiop lino 
Pattern Text 


file Kit Searcti ^^ractei 


Drai( - DRfly\PC^G.PIC 



MAGAZINE 


g Dra» - PROWNPCIlflG.PlC 


Write - tlUSINGS.DOC 


I hile tdit Draw Uptions Uieti Line 


Pattern Text 


File Edit Search Character 
Paragraph Docunent 

AsystMsuchasHnosolfsWMmKidlh is 

*aapMc$ Devin HMfact' *NK softMTt 

deviiopets to wtle pH9« alhoul mnym 
iboU awaiting Mny (MfMenl types at video 
adapteis. Homvci. video adepleis Hi contme to 
pby a signWcenI lote in pcisonal coHputeis as 
^ ■ptova " lasotution and cotoc rapaiiaig^. 


The IBM ColorlGraphics 
Adapter works with 
Windows, if you call this 
working. There's really 
only one word to describe 
this harsh black-and- 
white “high-resolution" 
mode of 200 lines by 640 
dots: ugly. 


An EGA attached to a 
monochrome display has 
slightly lower resolution 
than the Hercules 
Graphics Card (350 lines 
of 640 dots). Although 
four ’ 'colors’ ’ are 
available (black, green, 
bright green, and 
blinking green). Windows 
uses only the first two. 
Every time you move the 
mouse, it leaves traces (I 
almost said ' ‘droppings ‘ ' ) 
across the high- 
persistence display. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
168 







Ahhh. now we’ re getting 
someplace. The EGA 
attached to an IBM 
ColorIGraphics Display 
(or a 64K EGA attached 
to an IBM Enhanced 
Color Display) lights up 
your screen with color. 
The resolution is the same 
as the high-resolution 
black-and-white mode on 
an IBM Color/Graphics 
Adapter (200 lines of 640 
dots), hut the 16 colors 
make it much more 
attractive. 



File Edit Search Character 


File Edit Draw Options Uieu Line 
Pattern Text 


Paragraph Docuwent 


A system such as Microsoft’s 
Windows with its '‘Graphics Device 
Interlace" allows software developers 
to write programs without worrying 
about supporting many different types 
of video adapters However, video 
adapters will continue to play a 
significant role in personal computers 
as they improve in resolution and y 

color capabilities ** x 


IWrite - HUSINGS.DOCI 


iColor Cube 


MAGAZINE 


An EGA with 128K or 
256K of memory attached 
to an IBM Enhanced 
Color Display provides 
resolution of 350 lines by 
640 dots with 16 colors. 
That's the best the EGA 
can do, and it’s good 
enough for now. 
Compared with the next 
generation of video 
adapters, however, this 
will prtdxtbly look as 
crude as a CGA looks to 
us now. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 19H6 
169 











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Every few months, The NETWORK saves its 
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General Motors 
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Hewlett Packard 

Hughes Aircraft 

IBM 

ITT 

Kodak 

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t 


CALL TOLL FREE 
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m lIlKwIt CMI (312) 2SO-0002 a ^ A 
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You can valtdato your membership number and. if you wtsh. 
place your first money-saving order over the phone by using 
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SOFTWARE AT WHOLESALE -1-8%, 

1 4-30 DAY SOFTWARE RENTALS^ . . 

Listed below are just a few of the over 30,000 products available 
at our EVERYDAY LOW PRICES! 

GAMES & EDUCATIONAL SOFTWARE 

(Pleat* add St thipplng tnd handling lor each till* ordered from below.) 

Wholeui* 


PC NETWORK • MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION 

TSSl Please enroM me as a member m the PC NETWOW* and send my catalog leaturing 
thoutandt Of computer producta. ai al iuai 0^ above DEALER WHOLESALE PRICES I will 
aiao perndicalfy receive "THE PRINTOUT" a aoeciai uo-date on merchandise at oncea 
BELOW even thoae in my wholesale catalog, and all the other eiciuaive money-saving 
services available to Members 


149 □□ 


urHh 14 Oey NentaSt 

i One-year membership lor S8 
' ^m-year membership lor 
SIS (SAKE S1| 

Businets Soltware Rental 
Library for SSSadd'l oer 
year -with t4 day rentals 
: Games Software Rental 
Library lor SIO add'l per year 

VISA 


ly complete salistsction isguaranieeO Please 


One-year membership tor SIS 
Mo-year membership for $2S 
(SAVE SS) 

: BOTH Businese and Came Soltware 
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*VIP mempers receive advance nonce or 
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. BiH my credit card 

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H 


TL 


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(Signature leouired to validate membershipi 
Copynghic i98& PC NETWORK INC 


Biuechip VAAonarre O' Baron a Tycoon 
Brederbund Ancient an p/ iVa' 

Broderbund Lode Runnoi 
CBS Goren-Bnage UacJa £asy 
CBS Masrenr^ 'heSxr 
CD€X framing tot WotO Star 
Compreheneive fnfre to P^sonai COmpuimg 
Davidson Math Blaster no'aAHact>‘ 
Hayden Sargon lit 
Intmiduai Protessoi DOS 
Irtdividuel The In 
► Infocom '■ 

» Infocom Cf.i 


Mlerosofi Pfignr Simufativ 
Mouse Sysleme PC Rami-Tum your 
PC mio a Cotet Macmtosh' 


S19.7S’ 

22.75- 
17.25' 

40.00* 

SO.OO* 

37 .25- 
25.50* 

21.50* 

29.75* . ^ • 

29.75* ^ Spiimaher . 

24.50’ bublogic Nionf WiSS>On Hmeair 

24 00- SoWogie Jet 


ATI Ho* to Use Mcrosofl word 
ATI Ho* ro Use Lotus f -2-3 
P Ashton-Tate CiX' ■ 

► Ashton-Tsie 
Bortend SideKoii iProtecfed) 

Borland Turoo Pasca' 

Borland TurOo Pascal doer 
- - - J SuperK 
Breakthrough S 
Central Point C... 

Digital Research L. , 

Oigitel RssMTCh Ceei Ora* 

Ensrvonice Energraphos 
Punk Soflwsrs Sideways 
Harvard Harvard Protect Manager 
Harvard Harvera Total Pro/aci Manager 
Hsyst SfiteNCotn ff— New VT 100 Emulator 
^ Human Edge ^ Manage rnenr fdge 

Infocom Ojmerstone 
Llftlrs* Volkswriler Iff 
Lotus Lotus 1-2-3 
MicroPro WotOsiarSOOO 


BUSINESS SOFTWARE 

(Please add S2.50 shipping and handling lor each title ordered from below.) 


$31.25* 
37.25* 
365 00- 
-T66 00* 
24.50* 
39.00* 
34.00* 
51.00* 
203.00* 
16.25* 
25.00* 
117.00* 
143.00* 
32-00* 
175.00* 
225.00- 
68.00* 
24.00* 


Microsoft Uurripfan 
Monogram OoCais S Sense 
Mosaic The T*in 


Power Bass Po*er Base 
Real World GLAPARPRprOEffVV 
Rosesotl ProKey Version 4 
Ryan McFarland RM COBOL iDev Sysiemi 
Samna Samna * Word Pre^ssot 
Ssletllis Software Word Parted 
Softtiyla SET -EX 
Software Group Enatue 
Software Publishing PfS Pile Wnte Graph 


65.00* 

126.50* 

275.00* Sorcim Supe'caic ll 
209.00' 

HARDWARE 

(Plaasa add shipping and handling charges found In Italics 


Whoteseie 

$27.00* 

59-95* 

19.75* 

24,75* 

18.00* 

15 25- 


20.75* 

19.25* 

27.50* 


101.00- 
85.00* 
75.00* 
180 Of 
270.00* 
229.00’ 
84 00' 
ia-275 00* 
200.00* 
«.3S0.00* 
55.00* 
520 00- 
340.00* 
180.00* 
35.00* 
293.00* 
68.00* 
59.50* 
169.00* 


COMPLETE SYSTEMS 


MULTIFUNCTION CAROS 


COMPAQ 1 

Ponaae t Floppy * 256K 
COMPAQ DesAPre 
Harp Osk 20MB * 2S$K > Floppy 


IBM PC AT All Coni, as 
IBM PCATBaseL/n-f 
I 2M8 Floppy * 250K 


1,910.00' 14120) 


AST SitPakPremiun 

fr AST 

AST lOPiusll 


Tecmar Capravt MuMurtcion Card 
» Mil M2K Memory - .. 

k nil Mull! 184 : 


DISK DRIVES & CONTROLLERS 


PRINTERS 


340.00’ (9481 

495.00' ri089! 


► free 


k PC Network 
PC Network 20MB tiara Cara 525.00* 

Corrvfefe Manuels ana Software 
k Tandon .. . 12000* 

k IHl 20MB - '*.‘^' 367 00' 

AuiDdoor Drives by Seagate or Microse^erKe 
MEMORY CHIPS 
At! Chios Quaranteed for iiie 


Trae 


K Dyni 

^ ?S6K Dynamic Ram Chips .- 
^ 128K AT Mother Board Chips 


$9.00* 

1-00- 


MODEMS 

► Hayes • , S525 00- 

Hayes Smarrmodem 12008 wiffi new 305.00* 

smarfoom II VT 100 Emufafor 
Heyst SmaamoOem I200B Alone 265.00* 

Hayes SmarrmoiSem 1200 340.00* 

Prometheus PromoOem 1200 247.00* 

U S. Robotics Courier 84CK)PP5 Modem 345.00* .. . 

ALL THE ' MODEMS ARE tOOS HAVES COMPATIBLE 

► ill! IJ.TD Com Fiterno: I290f 

k IHl 2400 Com Eiternai 277 00* 

k lilt l200Comlnieriial il900' 


Cittieo MSP-tOAffW' 
f6£X:PS aOCOL Fro 
Cituen M$P-iSNEW‘ 

160CPS 132COL Fro * Trac 
ettUen MSP-25HEW‘ 

200CPS 13XOL Fro * Trac 
CtHztn Premiere 35 NEW 
3iCPS Da,sy*heet 132COL Fr 
Epson LK-eo 100CPS 90COL LO Mode' 
Epson FX-OS 

p. Eu-on 

NEC 20S0 20CPS Lena’ OuaMy Printer 
NEC 3550 3^PS Leffer OuaMy Pnniet 
NEC 3$S0 SSCPS Pnnier 

^ Okl0.1I.T '. , ^ . . 

^ Okidaia 
^ Okidat.T 


130.00* 

325 00- 

340 00- 

109.00* 

65 00- 

72 00* 


$225.00* 

315.00* 


360.00* 

190-00* 

33$.00’ 

. 485 00' 

. CALL 
570.00* 
690.00* 
920.00* 

188 00' 

299 00* 
42S 00- 


leaoi 
1940' 
(7 78> 


r^50f 
iSOOl 
iSOOl 
(5 00) 


554 


Quma ^r,nf Tt40 40CPStefre'Owi»fy 1.155.00* 
Oume fSM Caote artd miertace 'regwreO) 72.00* 
Texas Inatrumanla 855 OP LO w tractor 550.00* 
Toshiba NEW P341 210CPS 132COL 699,00* 

Toshiba /V£W’P35r388CPS t33COt 926.00* 

Toshiba 351 Parser 380CPS f32COl 966.00’ 


VIDEO CARDS 

Harcuiea Cofor Ca'd n Parallel Pon 
Hercults Arfonochrome Graphes Cards 
Paradise Ne* Modular Graphos Cara 


MONITORS 

Amdek Video 3104 Amder TTl MoniW 
Amdek Color t 
Amdek Cofd' i 
Magnsvox Amper IBM Type 7Tl Monitor 
NEC JC-1401 Mud-sync RGB CoiOrMon, lor 
Princeton HX-12 RGB Momiot 
Princeton hX-12E RGA or EGA Monitor 
Princeton MAX-12E 
Supports Either Mono or RGB Cards 
Taxen 630 Higri Ris RGB Monitor 
Taxsn SAOHghesi Res iT20t400i 
Currently A^aiiapie— Works *,in Persvst 


$126.00’ 

259.00* 

219.00* 

299.00* 


124 001 
II OOl 

lt108l 

USOV 
<20001 
121 34i 


l2S0i 
12 SOI 
l2 50i 
l250i 


$130.00* 

365.00* 

440.00* 

79.00* 

480.00* 

387.50* 

445.00* 

132.00* 


l999< 
IS OOl 
110371 
1837 1 
l983i 
IS 00' 


h Motv Ouai'iy T, 
sn The Chautler Cotor 8 Mono Cara 173.00* l2SOl 
Runs CoiOfSofi*a'ein Monochrome *ith No SpeeWDriyt 
P' INI EGA Pid'. 2J700* 

^ nil MT20 '.' 73.00- 

^ IHl Color C.Md ‘ 60.00* 

ACCESSORIES AND SUPPLIES 

^ Brand N,ime OS DD Diskettes S7 95* 

^ DS DD Bulk Pack Spec(a< ea .54* 


k PC Network : 


79 00* 


SMA PCDocumaie Keytoara Tempiaies es. 9.99* 
for Lolus DBase Muihmaie ana others 
Sony DS DD OrsAetfes 15.95* 

WP Printer Paper 3800 Sheers 17.00' 

Mcrolirte Peris (mvrsibfe When forn* 


tRENT BEFORE VOU BUY 


k'e.Hureover I .OttO .ivaii.tOi* iil 


in IBM Apple Mac andCPM 


COMPLETE SYSTEMS 


IBM PC BASE 
SYSTEM 
IBM PC W/256K 
Floppy Dnve Controller 
2 Double Sided Double 
Density Disk Drives 
Mix and Match with 
your Favonte Monitor 
and Printer! 

$ 1 , 159 . 00 * 



IBM PC 

HARD DISK SYSTEM 

IBM PC W/256K 
Floppy Drive Controller 
1 Double Sided Double 
Density Disk Drive 
Half Height Hard Disk 

W/20MB 

$ 1 , 499 . 00 * 


PORTABLE 
HARD DISK SYSTEM 

256K/1 Floppy^ard Disk 



DESKPRO SYSTEM 

256K CPU/1 Floppy/Hard Disk 


comPAa 


uj-:-;::: 

$ 1 , 910 . 00 ^ 


W/20MB 


call for 10MB 



II in 

$ 1 , 805.00 


$ 1 , 910 . 00 ' 


W/10MB 


W/20MB 


64K IBM PC MEMORY EXPANSION KITS 

Quantity Discounts Available. 

Guaranteed lor L 


r Life! Me 

M # 

W' ^ s 


$9.00* 


Set of 
9 Chips 


DISKETTES 

Guaranteed for Life! 

Brand name diskettes available in 
boxes of 10 or in bulk packs of 50 


1/2 HEIGHT DS/DD 
DISK DRIVES 


Th« Network txiys direct 
and makes fantastic deals 
Witt) manulacturers like 
*.tndon/COC/Shu9art/Oume/ 
1EAC/Hi-Tech and ottiers to 
iinng you fantastic prices on 
^Jame Brand drives for your 
PC/AT/XT/or Compatible 




$85.00* 


Quantity Dtacounts Available 


iP Lotus' 
$2^.p0' 



INTERNAL PC HARD DISK 

Low Power/Aulomatic Bool VMxks on standard PC^ 
and Compatibles Includes dnve/controller/cabtes/ 
mounting hardware and instructions 


% 


$310.00* 

20MB 

$367.00* 


Quantity Oiscourtts Available 


Wonll^irfect 

$180.00* 

MuItiMate" 


Wholesale Prices Change Rapidly... if you ever see a lower price advertised anywhere 
please call! You will find the Network’s Price will always be the best! 


NETWORK 


. . .WITH THESE 15 
UNIQUE BENEFITS 


1 COST + 8% PRICING— The NETWORK purchases mil- 
lions of dollars in merchandise each month You benefit m 
receiving ihe lowest price available and all at just 6% above 
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2 OUR 600 PAGE WHOLESALE CATALOG— Members re- 
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50 other popular computer systems THE NETWORK'S CATA- 
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^10 DAY RETURN POLICY — If you are not satisfied, for 

The 

entire purchase (less shipping) with no questions asked. 

5 MEMBERSHIP SATISFACTION GUARANTEE — It tor 
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30 days, we will refund your dues IN FULL 

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Our consulting staff possesses m excess of 1 50 man years of per- 
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MENDED BY OUR CONSULTING STAFF FAILS TO PERFORM 
AS PROMISED— WE WILL TAKE IT BACK AT OUR EXPENSE 
FOR A 100% REFUND. 

7 FREE TECHNICAL SUPPORT— The NETWORK supports 
every product it sells Our qualified TECH-SUPPORT staff will 
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ALL THE HELP YOU NEED. WHEN YOU NEED IT— FREE! 

1 0 OPTIONAL BUSINESS RENTAL LIBRARY —All mem 


any reason with any hardware component purchased from 
NETWORK within 10 days of receipt, we will refund your 


^9 



Members pay 8% above this wholesale price plus shipping. 

CALL TOLL FREE 1-800-621-S-A-V-E ^memberships^ 

In Illinois call (312) 280>0002 Validation code: a149 

Customer Service and Order Status (312) 280-1567 

TMSM-ltovMrvdlraeemwIuanMI/COMMO/xeeLE/AST flMMrilvLOTUS/WiMtai* M /lOMCCA 


bers can | 0 in our BUSINESS RENTAL LIBRARY featuring 
over fOOOavat/ab/e titles for just $25 PER YEAR above the base 
membership lee This entitles you to rent business software AT 
JUST 20% of the DISCOUNT PRICE FOR A 14 DAY PERIOD. If 
you decide to keep the software, the entire rental fee is de- 
ducted from the purchase price. VIP MEMBERS GET A FULL 
30 DAYS for just S30 above the V.I.P. base fee. This also in- 
cludes the game library privileges for a SS combination 
savings. 

OPTIONAL GAME SOFTWARE RENTAL LIBRARY — 

The Game Rental library is available to members for just $10 
PER YEAR and permits evaluation (or just enjoymeni) of any 
game or educational software product as above 
A n SPECIAL SAVINGS BULLETINS— THE PRINTOUT 
I U — Issued Quarterly at no charge to Network members only* 
The Printout contains all the New Product listings and price 
changes you need to keep your Catalog up to date Also we buy 
excess dealer inventories, and store bankruptcy closeouts, which 
we turn around and make available to our members at fantastic 
savings via THE PRINTOUT 

1 4 DISCOUNT BOOK LIBRARY — Working with numerous 
I publishers and distributors. The NETWORK has assembled 
a library of over 1000 computer related books and manuals at sav- 
ings of up to 75% from the riormal store price 

A Q MEMBERSHIP REFERRAL BONUS— Our most vaiu- 
I able source of new members is you' To date almost 40*'<> of 
our members have been referred by word of mouth from other sat- 
isfied members For those of you who refer new members. The 
NETWORK will credit a cash bonus to your account applicable to 
any future purchase 

A O CORPORATE ACCOUNT PROGRAM — Almost 50«e of 
I O The NETWORK'S members are corporate buyers and users 
(see opposite page left) The NETWORK can establish open 
account status and assign designated account managers to ex- 
pedite orders, and coordinate multiple location shipments 

A A QUANTITY DISCOUNTS — For large corporations clubs. 
I ^ and repeat or quantity buyers The NETWORK can extend 
additional single order discounts, when available to us from our 
manufacturers and distributors 

4 c ONL/WE- BULLETIN BOARD-Download 'Freeware' 
I 9 from Ihe nation's largest single concentration of Public 
Domain software available! (Set tied into the nation's largest tech- 
nical information network! Place orders, gel tech support or con- 
tact customer service from the Network's OnLine. 'not just a 
bulletin board but a complete customer information network. 







Simply put: THE™ highest quality and 
best value in computer products anywhere. 



THE commitment to our 
customers is compatibility, 
quality, value, 
service and support 

THE -backs 
every product with a 

45 DAY 
MONEY BACK 
GUARANTEE 


and a 

FULL 1 YEAR 
PARTS AND LABOR 
WARRANTY 


THE “MODEMS 

100% Hayes compatible 

THE - 1200 COM EXTERNAL 

This self-testing 1200 BPS modem comes 
with auto answenauto dial, auto redial and 
a built-in speaker. r««i pn« $i6i.25' 

$ 12 Q, 00 * 



THE -MULTI 384 

This multi-function card features 
0-384K memory, a serial port for 
communication, a parallel printer port, 
a clock/calendar with battery backup, 
and a software bonus which 
includes RAMdisk and 
other utilities, rmsu ssooo- 


THE™ 1200 COM INTERNAL 


Features auto answer, dial and redial, with 
! a built-in speaker, RS 232-C serial port 
I and PC Talk III. r™ii Pnce siia rs- 


$119.00* 



THE “COLOR CARD 

100% compatible with the IBM colorcard with 
display modes of 60x25 alphanumeric 
and 320x200 graphic. Rmti Pncc sts.oo* 

-“S $60.00* 

THE “576K MEMORY + 

Supports 0*576K of available memory and is 
compatible with all IBM ’“PC's. Retail Pnc< S46 2S* 

- ^ $37.00* 

THE “PRINTERFACE 

Supports all text and graphics features 

and is fully compatible with 

third party software. Retail Pnce S23.13* 

-Es $18.50* 


THE -2400 COM EXTERNAL 

Bght times the speed of a 300 BPS unit 
makes this 2400 Baud modem truly 
affordable, and we've made it truly 
j compatible. With auto answer, auto dial, 
auto redial, and a built-in speaker with 
volume control. Rei«i Pii« $346 zs- 

$2 77. 00 * 

THE-H720 MONO 

This monochrome graphics card with 
, printer port features 100% IBM '“and 
Hercules'” compatibility, at a fraction of 
I their prices. Rwaupnc* $91.25* 




ADAM OSBORN'S 
PAPERBACK SOFTWARE 

• Paperback Witer 

• Paperback Speller 

• Numberworks 
Spreadsheet 

$32.00* 

With the purchase of a PC *#* 



THE ''20MB HARD DISK 

Featuring a half-height IBM '“PC 
compatible internal 20MB disk drive, 
controller card, connecting cables 
and installation manual. Retail $456 75 


$3S7»00* 


THE -MULTI I/O 

Feature for feature, THE '“matches 
the AST '“I/O -I- and comes up a winner, 
with serial/parallel and game ports 
standard, (a second serial port 
optional), a clock/calendar, RAMdisk 
and print spooler. Retail puce $75.00 



$60.00* 

Sotdal 
Wh^sak 
Price 


THE “EGA PLUS 

With 256K standard this 100% IBM '“ EGA 
and Hercules Graphics compatible card is 
ideal for high resolution graphics display 
of Microsoft '“Windows, Lotus™ and 
AutoCAD™. Retail Price $283 75* 

$227*00* 


Thompson, Harriman and Edwards Computer 


‘AH Hwn* $ub|*ci to AvaU«i>fhty~Prle«» S ub|oc t 10 
TM-Rogfatmd TraOomarM ol leUAol RoMorcK 
MtcrooofVHorculoo HayM 



THE 


T\1 


Thompson, Harriman and Edwards 
Computer Products Company Ltd. 


THE PC + COMPUTER 

THE'“PC+ is compatible with all 
business, professional and personal 
software written for the IBM '“PC. It will 
also enhance your productivity with its 
ability to switch to an 8 megahertz clock 
rate, enabling you to run your software 
twice as fast as the 1BM'“PC.THE'"PC + 
also comes standard with an "AT'' style 
keyboard, correcting the inefficiencies 
found by IBM '“on their regular PC 
keyboard. 256K standard (640K optional) 
on the mother board will allow you to run 
memory intensive programs such as 
Lotus 1-2-3, DBase III and Framework 
without adding extra memory cards. Plenty 
of power, with a 135 Watt source and 
lots of room for expansion 
with 8 card slots is also 
standard. Base unit 
includes: 256K RAM. 

Computer with 
One 360K S'/t" Floppy 
Drive. Dual Turbo Clock 
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EGA STANDARD 


EMULATION: GOOD, BAD, AND UGLY 

Most existing software written for the Col- 
or/Graphics Adapter or the Monochrome 
Adapter will tun fine on the IBM EGA. 
Programs that directly manipulate some 
registers on the CGA or MDA board, how- 
ever, will send the display into seizures. 
For this reason, several manufacturers 
have attempted to implement CGA, 
MDA, and Hercules emulation on their 
EGA cards. 

The Chips and Technologies EnhaiKed 
Graphics CHIPSet does not easily lend it- 
self to this emulation. The registers that 
correspond to the 6845 registers are built 
into the CRT Controller chip, and nothing 
comparable to the CGA, MDA, and Her- 
cules mode register and color register is 
present. Significantly, the NSI EPIC 
board, the one that does not use the Chips 
and Technologies CHIPSet, is the only 
board that has a hardware solution to emu- 
lation. The other boards that include emu- 
lation (MegaGraph Plus, SigmaEGA!, 
TEGA-22, QuadEGA-l-, and VEGA) all 
use a software approach. The difference in 


results makes it clear that hardware emula- 
tion is superior. 

None of the manufacturers that used 
software emulation were willing to di,scuss 
details with me. When 1 described my un- 
derstanding of the method to a technical 
representative at one company, he com- 
mented that my description was "good 
enough for government work.” That is not 
quite the standard PC Magazine aspires to- 
ward, but it will have to do. 

The method used by the Video-7 
VEGA and Quadram QuadEGA+ boards 
is characteristic of the software approach 
to emulation . Supplied with these boards is 
a RAM-resident program that you use to 
turn on or turn off CGA or Hercules emu- 
lation. This program manipulates a special 
register on the hoard to generate a “non- 
maskable interrupt” whenever the board 
receives a command from a program to 
load one of the CGA or Hercules registers 
that is either not duplicated on the EGA or 
that has a different meaning. (This non- 
ma.skable interrupt is normally used by the 
PC to catch memory errors and shut down 


your system with the infamous “Parity 
Check” message.) 

When a program attempts to write to 
one of these registers, the resident software 
intercepts this nonmaskable interrupt. If 
the register is one of the 6845 registers that 
is not defined the same as the EGA regis- 
ters with the same addresses, it will simply 
ignore it. If the register is the non-6M5 
mode control on the CGA or Hercules, it 
will initiate a mode change through normal 
BIOS logic. 

Since this emulation technique requires 
the resident program, it cannot be used 
with software that must boot directly from 
a floppy disk. In addition, because it is a 
resident program, the emulation software 
may conflict with other programs. For in- 
stance, two of the debuggers I used (or 
tried to use) to understand the workings of 
this emulation technique were also using 
the nonmaskable interrupt as a hardware 
break. Every time I tried to load a CGA 
register, IBM’s Professional Debug Facili- 
ty told me that I should check my memory 
for parity errors. 



^ ft EGA Boards: Summary of Features 






List price 




Card 

Manulacturer 

G4K 

ZSOK 

Extras 

Wvfwrtv 

Sollwan 

IWIBll 

PC Designs Enhanceil Graiililcs Adapter 

PC Designs 

— 

S299 

— 

1 year 

None 

Half 

rm EGA Master 

LiUj Tecmar 

— 

$395 

— 

1 year 

None 

Full 

EGA Pius 

STB Systems 

— 

$495 

Optional serial 
port ($50) 

2 years 

PC Accelerator 
utilties 

Full 

MegaGraph Plus 

ATronics International 

— 

$549 

— 

1 year 

None 

Half 

AST-3G Model 1 

AST Research 

$450 

S550 

Parallel 

port 

2 years 

Diagnostics. 

demo 

Full 

EPiC Graphics Adapter Card 

NSI Logic 

$495 

$595 

Optional parallel 
port ($25) 

2 years 

Emulation 

Fpn 

QeadEGA-i- 

Quadram Co. 

— 

$595 

— 

1 year 

Emulation. 

diagnostics 

Half or 
full 

SigmaEGAI 

Sigma Designs 

— 

S595 

— 

1 year 

Emulation. 

PC Paintbrush 

Half 

Spectra EGA Modei 4800 

Genoa Systems Corp. 

— 

$599 

Parallel port; Optional 
clock ($29.95) 

1 year 

Utilities 

Full 

TEGA-22 

Tatung Co. of America 

— 

$599 

— 

1 year 

Emulation 

Half 

VEGA 

Video-7 

— 

$599 

— 

2 years 

Emulation, 

diagnostics 

Half or 
full 

iOM Enhanced Graphics Adapter 

IBM Corp. 

$524 

$982 

— 

1 year 

Diagnostics 

Full 

Note: Products are listed in order of increastrtg price. 

fse 

— tndtcales Editor's Choice 




r 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
174 


If a CGA program attempts to legiti- 
mately manipulate a 6845 register not du- 
plicated in the EGA, it will be ignored. If 
an EGA-aware program attempts to ma- 
nipulate some of these overlapping regis- 
ters in emulation mode, it will also be ig- 
nored. 

The resultant emulation is nowhere 
close to 100-percent register compatible, 
and it’s not even BIOS compatible. For in- 
stance, on a CGA in graphics mode 6 (200 
line by 640 dot two color), the following 
assembly language BIOS call will turn the 
foreground blue: 

MOV BX,0001h 
MOV AH.0Bh 
INT 10h 

In CGA emulation mode, the (JuadEGA + 
and VEGA boards respond by making the 
background blue, which is the same thing 
that happens on an EGA board in nonemu- 
lation mode. On the CGA board, you can 
create a blue foreground in high resolution 
by going directly to the CGA color register 
(using BASIC syntax): 


OUT &H3D9,1 

This is an output port not implemented on 
the EGA, and normally nothing happens. 
In CGA emulation mode on the (Juad- 
EGA-I- and VEGA boards, the same thing 


■ Because it is resifient 
software, Video-7 
and Quadram’s CGA- and 
Hercules-emulation 
program may conflict 
with other programs. 

happens: nothing. You can go through a 
couple years' worth of PC Magazine's 
User-to-User columns and try out all the 
CGA special effects, but you’ll find that 


virtually none of them work in Video-7’s 
and Quadram’s CGA emulation mode. 

Don’t get the wrong impression, how- 
ever: the CGA emulation mode definitely 
will run some programs that cannot run on 
an EGA. Lotus’s 1-2-3, Release lA, with 
the original CGA drivers, runs graphics 
with the CGA emulators, which is more 
than it does on a standard EGA. You’ll no- 
tice some speed degradation during dis- 
play updates and some intermittent gar- 
bage on the screen when switching from 
graphics to text, but it works. (You can 
also get Lotus’s EGA drivers for 1-2-3, 
Release 1 A, which will work a lot better.) 
You can also run Flight Simulator if you 
execute it as a program instead of booting 
from the disk. The EGA cannot do these 
things, and Quadram’s and Video-7’s 
boards can. Just be aware of their limita- 
tions. 

I’m not picking on Quadram and Vid- 
eo-7; the SigmaEGA! and Tatung TEGA- 
22 boards also have resident software that 
uses the same type of approach as the 
VEGA and (JuadEGA-l- , but that only (at 


Chip 

count 

Graphics 

cWp 

Color/graphics 

Claiitwd Acini 

Emalation 

Monochrome adapter 
Claimed Acini 

1 

Henales graphics 
Claimed Actual 

Technical 

relerence 

anilaHe 

BIOS copyrighl 

BIOS version 
(or date) 
tested 

23 

Chips and 
Technoiogles 

No 

— 

No 

— 

No 

— 

No 

Eden Software 

1.00 

38 

Chips and 
lechnoioflies 

No 

— 

No 


No 

— 

No 

Interlink Busi- 
ness Network 

1.21 

40 

Chips and 
Technolooles 

No 

— 

No 

— 

No 

— 

Planned 

STB and Award 
Software 

1.07 

23 

Chips and 
'Mchnoioaies 

Yes 

Erratic 

No 


Yes 

Erratic 

No 

Eden Software 

1.03H 

41 

Chips and 
Technoloples 

No 

— 

No 

— 

No 

— 

Planned 

Interlink Busi- 
ness Network 

1.19 

33 

Proprietary 

Yes 

Very good 

Yes 

Good 

No 

— 

Yes 

NSI 

2.15 

(10/31/85) 

28 

Chips and 
Technokipies 

Yes 

Adequate 

No 

— 

Yes 

Adequate 

No 

Video-7 

1.03 

(1/29/86) 

30 

Chips and 
lechnoloqles 

No 

— 

No 

— 

Yes 

Adequate 

Planned 

Sigma Designs 

1.06 

41 

Ctlips and 
Technologies 

No 

— 

No 


No 

— 

Planned 

Genoa 

1.10 

30 

'Chips and 
Technologies 

No 

— 

No 

— 

Yes 

Adequate 

Planned 

(Siqma Designs) 

Sigma Designs 

1.04 

28 

Chips and 
Technologies 

Yes 

Adequate 

No 

— 

Yes 

Adequate 

Planned 

Video-7 

1.04B 

(3/19/86) 

75 

Proprietary 

No 

— 

No 

— 

No 

— 

Yes 

IBM 

9/13/84 






VIDEOGRAM 3.0 
GRAPHICS 
SOFTWARE 
FOR THE EGA 

VIOEOGRAM paint aoftware will 
run on any 256K EGA and it 
will run faator. 

VIOEOGRAM graphics diroctly 
address ths EGA chip sot in 
asssmblar. 

No other product can match it 

or course VIOEOGRAM does all 
you expect of a professional 
freehand paint and draw program. 
Full 64 color palette 
Full 640 by 350 resolution 
Full EGA 2S6K support 
Color icons, Image capture 
Mouse or digitixer drawing 
Oesigner brushes, magnify 
Shape ar>d image libraries 
A built in slideshow, fill 

In fact PC Magazine said 
VIOEOGRAM "exploits the EGA 
to the fullest of its potentiar 


D 

m 



01 

o 


VIOEOGRAM was designed for the 
professional, the artist or 
business person that uses a 
presentation graphics program 
everyday. 


VIDEOGRAM DOES 
WHAT OTHER 
PROGRAMS 
CANNOT DO 

VIDEOGRAM autOfntticBliy saves your 
currer^t image while you work. 


D 

m 

O 

Q 

3D 

> 


VIOEOGRAM remembers the last image 
you worked on and restores rt to the 
screen the next time you run. 

VIOEOGRAM gives you a full screen cut 
and paste with superimpos/fion. if you 
want to cut a person from orye image 
and paste the person in another image 
you don’t take the background with you 


Ol 

o 


VIOEOGRAM gives you 43 text fonts in 
point sizes from 5 dots to 32 dots. 

Before locking in your text you can 
change the font, size, color, or 
position of the text without erasing or 
disturbing the graphics. 

VIOEOGRAM gives you any 16 colors in a 
paiette stored with the image. Any 
color can be changed instantly to any 
of 64 or you can create a rrew palette 
and add it to the library or you can re- 
map any of the colors anywhere on the 
screen into any other set of colors or 
you can create new colors using a 
ditherizing brush. 

Need any more ways to store and 
change colors? Well try our fill. 

It changes the color you point to into 
the color you select at blinding speed. 

VIOEOGRAM is the most professional 
software for the EGA board. 



Now its also the least expensive. 

GOFTEL INC. 

25 MAPLE LANE 

EAST HAMPTON. N.Y. 11$37 

212-677-6599 

Producing graphics software 
for the IBM PC since 1982 


Ol 

o 


m EGA STANDARD 


this time) implements Hercules Graphics 
Card emulation. 

Under Hercules emulation, the Sig- 
maEGA!. TEGA-22, QuadEGA+, and 
VEGA boards all ran 1-2-3 with the Her- 
cules drivers. Microsoft Windows installed 
for a Hercules card, and HBASIC. But if 
you try running Microsoft Word, Version 
2.0. with the /H option (which will give 
you 43 lines on a Hercules card). Word 
will not recognize the board as a Hercules 
and will instead use 25 lines in EGA 
monochrome mode 15. (The new Version 


3 of Word will give you 43 lines on an 
EGA. too.) 

The ATronics MegaGraph Plus takes a 
slightly different approach to emulation. 
Instead of supplying a resident program. 
ATronics built the emulation routines into 
the BIOS. When you boot up your PC. the 
BIOS displays a message to the screen tell- 
ing you to press F2 for emulation mode. 
You can press another key for nonemula- 
tion or wait about 1 0 seconds for booting to 
continue. The MegaGraph Plus will pro- 
vide CGA emulation on a color display 


IN PURSUIT OF THE IBM 
EGA TECHNICAL REFERENCE 

If you prepare correctly — memorize the right question, 
anticipate the wrong answers, and practice not flinching 
when you hear the price — you can get your very own 
EGA Tech Ref. 


I BM’s 164-page Technical Reference 
manual for the Enhanced Graphics 
Adapter contains a description of ^1 the 
EGA registers, a schematic diagram of 
the board, a complete commented listing 
of the ROM BIOS, and a few small pro- 
gramming examples. This document is 
essential for anyone who wishes to use 
the EGA BIOS or develop graphics ap- 
plications for the EGA independent of 
the graphics interfaces of packages like 
Microsoft Windows or IBM’s Graphics 
Development Toolkit. 

You may have a problem finding the 
EGA Tech Ref and may conclude that 
it’s only available to people with contacts 
or a specific need to know. Even autho- 
rized IBM dealers often don’t know that 
the EGA Tech Ref exists. 

But it does exist. If you want it, here is 
how you can get it: 

■ Go to an authorized IBM dealer and 
say, “I want the two-volume Options 
and Adapters Technical Reference Man- 
ual, IBM part number 6322509.” Do not 
flinch when the salesperson says, “That 
will be $125, please.” Don’t be too dis- 
tressed when you take it home and find 
out it's rather skimpy and doesn’t contain 


anything about the EGA. 

■ Very important: trapped between the 
shrink wrap and the two-volume manual 
is a card entitled “Update Information 
Service Registration Card. ” Don’t throw 
it away. Fill it out and drop it in a mail- 
box. This card entitles you to all updates 
published between April 1984 (when the 
manual was first published) and Septem- 
ber 1986. 

■ Try not to be too impatient at first, but, 
as you enter the fourth week, you are en- 
titled to start anticipating a box from 
UPS. This box contains a third binder 
(you’ll need it) and a whole pile of up- 
dates. Besides the EGA pages, you’ll get 
technical reference documentation for 
the Professional Graphics Controller 
(200 pages), the Data Acquisitions 
Adapter (142 pages), the Voice Commu- 
nications Adapter (S3 pages), and lots 
more. 

■ If you discover items in the EGA Tech 
Ref that don’t quite make sense or agree 
with reality as you’ve experienced it, 
don’t be alarmed. The manual is packed 
with errors, but if you’re already in this 
deep, you’ll probably have fiin figuring 
them out. — Charles Petzold 


CIRCLE 128 ON READER SERVICE CARD PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1985 

175 



Meanwhile, our competition is still in the pits. 


These days, to win the “advanced tech- 
nology" race, you have to have great per- 
formance and a great price. 

At PC Designs, we*ve earned quite a repu- 
tation offering just that. Our component 
computer kits have consistently blown the 
doors off of everything in their price range 
(and many costing a lot more). 

But our new 8MHz AT is the best example 
yet of supercharged power at a sub-compact 
price. That‘s why we call it The PC Designs 
TUrbo AT. It takes the checkered flag for per- 
formance. yet it costs just $1995 complete. 
(Compare that to the '‘limited" ATs that 
aren’t even race-ready— you have to supply 
a monitor and display ca^). 

What’s under the hood? 

At the heart of our lUrbo AT is a supe^fast 
8MHz 80286 microprocessor. But that’s just 
the beginning . . ,read on: 

• Rilly IBM "AT" compatible BIOS 

• Optional 6MHz operation 

• One Megabyte on-board RAM 

• 192-watt power supply 

• Optional 80287-8 math coprocessor 

• TWo Centronics parallel ports and two 
RS232 asynchronous communication 
ports 

• Princeton Graphics MAX-12 amber mono- 
chrome display 

• High resolution monochrome graphics 
display card 

• Choice of 360K or 1.2 Megabyte floppy 
drive (with combination noppy/hard disk 
controller) 

As usual, there’s a lot more. Like a SETUP 
program that configures everything from 


RAM size to video adapter type, a CMOS 
clock/calendar (with battery back-up), AT- 
style case and chassis (steel, not plastic] and 
a low-profile, IBM "selectric" t)^e AT-com- 
patible keyboard. 





Something Special 

That’s a lot for just $1995. But there's one 
very special component we didn’t list that you 
won’t find anywhere else: The proven com- 
mitment to its customers PC Designs is fa- 
mous for. We originated the component com- 
puter kit idea so we could assure you of the 
oest performance at the best price. So if you'd 
like to upgrade; tell us what you want to do — 
chances are, we've got the components you 
need at a price that will astonish you. 

Call Us Now 

With these kind of features at such a low 
price, our new Hirbo AT is going to move 
very fast, indeed. So call PC Designs today 


at the number below and place your order 
(And while you’re at it, ask us about our risk- 
hee, money back guarantee and one-year 
warranty). 

The PC Designs llirbo AT . . . tbst-lane 
performance at a sub-compact price. 


Special Offer 

Place your order before Sept. 1, 1986 
and get our new Enhanced Graphics 
Adapter for just $175 (We usually sell 
this EGA for $299— and even that’s a 
great price!). 

Our new EGA is fully IBM -compatible 
and gives you all the versatility and 
power of an IBM Enhanced Graphics 
Adapter, a Color Graphics Adapter and a 
high-resolution Monochrome Display 
Adapter. And, thanks to some very 
powerful VLSI chip development, it 
offers all this on a ^If-size expansion 
board. 

• 256K high-speed video display 
buffer memory 

• RAM loadable character generator 

• ROM BIOS compatible with IBM EGA 

• 32'pin feature connector 

• Light pen interface 

Upgrade your Tirbo AT right away! 
Call us now. 



11105-B East 56th St. 
Iblsa, Oklahoma 74146 
(918) 252-5550 


CIRCLE 371 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



NEW DASH FOR YOU 


REGK 


Your old printer should look so good. 

Introducing the ImagEnhancer™ PC add- 
on board. It enables ordinary monochrome 
or color dot matrix printers to produce high- 
quality, plotter-like graphics. 

THE OUTPUT IS OUTSTANDING. 

The ImagEnhancer is the perfect way to 
get presentation-quality graphs, charts and 
artwork from your old dot matrix printer. 

What's more, it comes with a built-in 
512K memory. So while your printer is 
printing one job, you can use your PC for 
another. Which will improve your productivity 
tremendously. 

And of course, the ImagElnhancer works 
with the same computer products most 
everyone works ■with. 

IBM" PCs, XTs, ATs or 100% compatibles 
with graphics 
capability. 

Alps, Epson* 
or Epson- 
compatible 
monochrome or 
color dot matrix 
printers. And 
Houston Instrument (DM/PL) plotter- 
compatible software, including Lotus’ 1-2-3’ 
Symphony,’ PFS"; Graph and Frameworkr 
among others. 

AND THE PRICE IS RIGHT. 

At $595f the ImagEnhancer costs a 
fraction of what you'd pay for a new plotter. 

It's simple to install, too. And backed by a 
one-yeetr warrcinty. 

'The ImagEnhancer is a product of Alps 
America, a U.S. subsidiary of Alps Electric 
Co., Ltd. of Japan, an International Fortune 



The ImagEnhancer PC add-on board brings 
plotter-like output to dot matrix printers. 


REVENUE ($M) 
$500 



500 company. Other Alps America products 
include a full line of high-quality printers. 

For more information, print samples, or 
the name of the dealer/dishibutor nearest 
you, write to Alps America, 3553 North 
First Street, San Jose, CA 95134. Or call 
(800) 828-ALPS. In California, (800) 257-7872. 
In Canada, (800)858-2577. 

Better yet, send in this coupon along 
with your payment. And teach your old dot 
matrix some new tricks. 


ImagEnhancer IS a trademark of Alps Electric Co.. Ltd. Other computer or software names are trademarks and/or tradenames of their respective manufacturers. C1966 Alps America. 


ROLD DOT MATRIX. 

lAL SALES FORECAST 



•^a-5 "O®® 


^West 
East 


North 

South 


This image was printed with an ordinary dot matrix printer and the ImagEnhancer PC add-on board. 


SO ORDER TODAY. 

Name: 

Address : 

City: 

State: Zip: 

Phone: 

Send ImagEnhancer(s) at $595 each* * 


Method of payment (circle one): 

Check Money Order MASTERCARD VISA 

Card number: 

Exp. date: 

Signature: 

Mail to: Alps America 
3553 North First Street 
San lose, CA 95134 
Or call (800) 828-ALPS 
In California, (800) 257-7872 


*Add $10.(X] shipping and handling for each. California residents add 7% sales tax. 
Offer available in USA. only. 


ALPS 

AMERICA 


CIRCLE 229 ON READER SERVICE CARD 

V 






640 x 350 


IBM* Color Graphics Adapter 


320 x 200 


Hercules” Graphics Adapter 


97% of all PC owners 

use the functions of 

QaadEGAh 


IBM* Enhanced Graphics Adapter 


Quad£GA+. The "All'in-One” graphics board 

QuadEGA+ combines onto one board die four most-popular video display 
standards. The standards used by practically every PC owner. Monochrome 
text, monochrome graphics, color graphics, and the 
Enhanced Graphics with 16 colors out 
of a palette of 64. 


Windows By MICROSOFT 

Special Discount Offer 

Totally Compatible 

With all this power, you can use your present software and also be prepared for 
the future. QmdEGA+ delivers across die board compadbiliw with numerous 
standard software packages as well as new EGA-supported software like Lotus 
1-2-3™ V 2.0, Symphony™ vl . 1 , Flight Simulator,™ Framework 11,™ AutoCAD,™ 
GEM,™ Microsoft Windows,™ Microsoft Word,™ and hundreds more. 




Better Value 

QuadEGA-h works great with standard monochrome and RGB color monitors. 
Ife it works with die new enhanced color displays, like die QgadChrome 
Enhanced Display. And crisp color and text in EGA mode eliminates eye strain. 
But best of all, while QuadEGA-h features all the power of the 256K IBM* 
Enhanced Graphics Adapter, it’s priced like die 64K version. 

To see the QuadEGA-l- difference for yourself, just visit your local Quadram 
dealer. Or contact us at One Quad Way, Norcross, Georgia 30093; 
404-564-5566. 


— I-- M Qaadnm Coraoratiau. 

DvotraratM Wl|^ wm mdiitmAt d ^ it w Tc 

C at^ CtM ift « of Dt^ral rh toe. Wna tux M • ^ MkioPra, 


QUADRAM 

■ An Msigeni Systems Company 



720 x 348 


IBM* Monochrome Text Adapter 



640 x 350 


CIRCLE 190 ON READER SERVICE CARD 






■ EGA STANDARD 


and Hercules emulation on a monochrome 
display. There is no way to turn off initial 
boot message, even if you never want em- 
ulation. The MegaGraph (without the 
Plus) sells for $499 and does not include 
emulation or this message “feature.” 

Instead of using the nonmaskable inter- 
rupt, ATronics uses IRQ2, which in soft- 
ware is interpreted as an Inteirupt OAh. 
This interrupt was originally “reserved” 
by IBM, but with the introduction of the 
EGA it has become officially designated as 
the EGA interrupt, since the EGA can gen- 
erate an IRQ2 on vertical retrace. Other 
hardware, such as the Microsoft Bus 
Mouse, also uses IRQ2. 

I found the ATronics emulation erratic: 
sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t. 
Sometimes the screen went blank after I 
pressed F2. Sometimes it said I had emula- 
tion mode and I really didn’t. Other times, 
however, it worked about as well as the 
other four boards that use software emula- 
tion. 

Since these manufacturers consider 
their emulation methods to be proprietary, 
the additional registers they’ve included on 
the board to support emulation are not doc- 
umented. 

My experience with these software em- 
ulation techniques led me to admire the at- 
titudes of some companies (like Tecmar) 
that told me outright they don’t think that 
emulation is an important issue and they 
have no plans to implement something 
similar. It also increased my admiration 
for the one board reviewed here that han- 
dles emulation through hardware: the NSI 
EPIC. 

EMULATION THE RIGHT WAY The 

NSI EPIC board takes a very different ap- 
proach to emulation. Since NSI developed 
its own video chip, it was able to include 
CGA and MDA emulation right in the 
hardware. NSI has no plans to include 
Hercules emulation since it believes 
monochrome displays on the EGA will not 
be common. 

The CGA and MDA emulation on 
NSI’s EPIC is complete except for inter- 
lace, which is sometimes used for creating 
50-line displays on these boards. I couldn’t 
find anything wrong with it. The EPIC 
uses some of the “unused” bits of certain 
EGA registers to control emulation. The 


riT]J EDITOR’S 
yy CHOICE 


The generally consislent high quali- 
ty of the 1 2 EGA boards reviewed 
here means you really can ' t go 
wrong with any of them. The best 
overall value is offered by Tecmar' s 
EGA Master, which combines the 
Chips and Technologies Enhanced 
Graphics CHIPSet with a BIOS 
nearly free of problems on a $395 
card. Its serial port option (not 
available on any other EGA hoard) 
is ideal for a mouse and makes the 
EGA Master a good hardware com- 
panion to Microsoft Windows. Tec- 
mar’s thumbs-down position on 
CGA emulation can only be viewed 
as admirable in the light of the slop- 
py emulation techniques that other 
manufacturers have wastffidly pur- 
sued. 

A few of the other boards also 
.stand out for specific features: Sig- 
ma Designs' SigmaEGA! has the 
lea.st buggy BIOS and hardware, 
STB Systems’ EGA Plus has the 
fastest re-entrant BIOS teletype rou- 
tines. NSI Logic’s EPIC Graphics 
Adapter Card has the best CGA em- 
ulation. and the IBM Enhanced 
Graphics Adapter has a hulk and 
heft that seems cluirmingly quaint in 
comparison with functiomilly equiv- 
alent EGA boards one-third its size. 


EPIC BIOS also supports emulation 
modes with a modest extension to the 
“Mode Change” function call. It’s all 
documented in NSI’s EPIC Technical Ref- 
erence manual. 

The CGA emulation of the EPIC board 
is so authentic it’s uncanny. Suddenly 
you’re looking at those familiar grainy 
characters on a screen that flickers when it 
scrolls. You’ll think someone stole your 
EGA board and replaced it with a CGA. 
NSI is so sure of its emulation that it uses 
the PC’s regular BIOS for most BIOS 
calls. 

Although EPIC’S MDA emulation 
mode uses monochrome attributes that 


GelaGrip 
on Assembly 
Language. 


The award winning 
Visible Computen 



The Visible Computer is a book and software 
combination for mastering the elusive skills of 
assembly language. 

Ifs an animated simulation of the PC’s 
microprocessor that lets you see with your own 
eyes how assembly language works. You’ll be 
using it as a debugging tool for years to come. 

Its a tutorial. A lot of people think the 350 
page manual is the best book on assembly 
language ever written. 

Its 45 demonstration programs you’ll execute 
with the simulator, from simple register loads 
to advanced programs that manipulate 
interrupts and perform file I/O. 

• Applies to all 86 family processors, including 
80186 and 80286. 

• PC Tech Journal “Program of the Month." 



Unprotected 


The VisiUe Computer for IBM PC/XT/AT and true 
compatibles. If your dealer doesn’t have it, order direct: 
Software Masters, 2714 Pinfeather, Bryan, TX. 77801. 
(409) 822-9490. Please include S3.00 shipping. 

Bank cards accepted. 



TVC takes you inside the 
processor as it executes programs. 


Softvuare Masters" 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
181 


CIRCLE 467 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




■ EGA STANDARD 


closely resemble the IBM Monochrome 
Adapter's, they are not quite identical, 
(Neither, for that matter, are those on the 
Hercules Graphics Card.) 

But here’s the most interesting thing: 


the EPIC does not reset the video mode on 
a Ctrl-Alt-Del reset. Once you tun the pro- 
gram to switch into emulation mode, you 
can tun non-DOS bootable disks or even 
other operating systems. In addition, you 


can set CGA or MDA emulation modes, 
via DIP switches on the board, to be in ef- 
fect at power-up. 

Moreover, the EPIC can do something 
in hardware that people have spent count- 
less hours trying to do in software: it can 
stop the cursor from blinking. 

The only teal problem with EPIC’s em- 
ulation involves “smart” programs like 
Microsoft Word, Version 2.0, that recog- 
nize an EGA through unorthodox meth- 
ods. In CGA emulation mode. Word still 
thinks that the EPIC is an EGA board. 
However, because Word can’t switch the 
adapter to mode 16, nothing much hap- 
pens. 

The hardware emulation of the CGA 
implemented in NSI’s EPIC card is so 
clearly superior to the software emulation 
of the other boards reviewed here that it is 
beyond comparison. If you need it, here it 
is. However, EPIC’s failings in EGA fea- 
tures indicate more clearly than ever what 
a superb job Chips and Technologies has 
done in its Enhanced Graphics CHIPSet 
design. 

THE FUTURE The CGA and Hercules 
emulation issue will refuse to die for a 
while longer, I suspect. Surely there’s no 
real harm in emulation if it doesn't degrade 
overall performance, and it would be nice 
to have one adapter that can really mimic 
the operation of several different adapters. 
One obvious approach is to put both a 
Chips and Technologies Enhanced Graph- 
ics CHIPSet and a 6845 on one bo^. 
Such a board will probably be available by 
the time you read this, although I can’t pre- 
dict which company will produce it or 
speculate on how well it will perform. 

The EGA is not the last word in video 
adapters. But right now, with thanks due in 
large part to Chips and Technologies for 
doing the dirty work, the EGA is the only 
video adapter that can serve as a modestly 
priced near-universal replacement for the 
old Monochrome and Color/Graphics 
Adapters and even (sorry, Hercules) the 
Hercules Graphics Card . Ej 


Charles Peizold is a contributing editor of 
PC Magazine. See the Programming col- 
umn in this issue for the beginning of his 
two-part exploration into some of the 
EGA’s hidden talents. 


Precursor Makes The 
Hard Disk Easy. ' 


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Not memory rcfident 
Not copy protected 
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PreCursor is an amazingly compact 
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the hard disk. 

PreCursor appears each time the 
computer is turned on with a list of avail* 
able programs. It allows simple menu 
choices of even the most Comdex DOS 
commands. 

Sophisticated users will love the conve* 
nience of full interaction with batch files, 
passable parameters and user prompts. 
Beginners will appreciate the sure ease of 
operation. 

Installing PreCursor is fast and easy. 
On-line help is always available. There’s 

The Aldridge Company 
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Houston, l^as 77024 
(713)464-7465 
Dealers IiKiuiries Welcome 

PrcCunor will run on IBM compatible MS-DOS lytiema. 

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no need to know paths or subdirectories 
or other complicated syntax. Assign 
passwords or even change the color of 
PreCursor. 

If you depend on your hard disk for 
businesslike perfbrmalrce, you can rely 
on PreCursor for instant access and 
increased productivity. 

The Aldridge Company is proud to 
share just a few of the quotes we receive 
about PreCursor. . . 

Excellent produa! Easy to use! LC., Ohio 
Ezncostic. D.G., Singapore 
We’ve found this program to be an excellent 
tool to guide the inexperienced users to the 
program they r\eed to run. 

J.F., San Francisco 

Outstanding program. K.B., Arizona 
Easy to install. F.G., Miami 


CIRCLE 195 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE 


AUGUST 1986 


gorhuiega 

Genoa makes your PC locdi better. 

Outselling the rest, 
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Genoa Systems Corporation, the bold new 
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CIRCLE 2390NREADER SERVICE CARD 


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EnerGraphics 2.0 
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CIRCLE 336 ON READER SERVICE CARD 














■ COMPUTERS ■ ROBIN RASKIN 


Biiild-¥)ur-Own 
Alternatives fcr 


AT 

POWER 


You don’t need a 
background in electrical 
engineering to create 
your own personal AT- 
style machine. These two 
computers offer customization 
to those willing to 
turn a few screws. 


B oy, do I feel smug! I’ve got my feet up on the 
desk as I listen to my two newly built AT com- 
patibles hum along contentedly. Better yet, 
my build-it-yourself machines are mnning at lightning 
processor speeds: 10 MHz. 

These two respectable alternatives come from dis- 
tinctly different backgrounds. Machine number one is 
the new PC Designs ET286i (ET stands for Enhanced 
Technology) kit, which includes everything you need 
to build your own in one tight package. PC Designs re- 
lieves you of any other purchasing duties: your job is 
simply to connect the components, which are guaran- 
teed to work together. Machine number two, howev- 
er, required a bit more know-how because it wasn’t a 
prepackaged kit. I based the system on a Red River 
Technology motherboard and pieced the machine to- 
gether with components purchased separately. Con- 
siderably more challenging to acquire than the PC De- 
signs kit, but not much more difficult to assemble, the 
Red River design is much more customized to my own 
tastes and needs. However, buying what I wanted sep- 
arately cost me more than buying a complete system 
kit from PC Designs. 

You don’t have to be a high-tech, wires-and-pliers 
hardware nut to assemble an AT kit. I was not the kind 
of kid, for example, who was attracted to Tinker Toys 
and Erector Sets. I’ve never been possessed by a drive 
to discover the way things work. As an adult. I’m in- 
clined to leave the insides of machines to others who 
find hardware anatomy fascinating. 

So what’s a nontechie like me doing putting togeth- 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
IBS 


■ BUILD-YOUR-OWNAT 


er an AT? Since outgrowing my old dual- 
floppy disk PC compatible. I’ve been 
searching for an AT compatible with a per- 
fect price/performance ratio. I suspected 
that kits would offer a lot for the buck. 

Building my own AT also nudged 
along my growing awareness that only I 
could configure my system to meet my 
own well-defined needs. The situation has 
changed drastically from the days when 
anyone could walk into a store, order an 
off-the-shelf machine, and not worry 
about peripherals. The fact is, expansion 
boards, cards, and peripherals require 
product savvy and a good understanding of 
your own particular — perhaps even idio- 
syncratic — configuration needs. 


■ The technical skills 
required for assembling 
an ET286i are the 
same as those required 
to upgrade a PC by 
adding a hard disk. 


Over 3 months have passed since I be- 
gan my quest to build my perfect AT. Most 
of this time has been spent not in assem- 
bling the kits, but in acquiring the parts. 
Pve waited patiently for components to ar- 
rive, sent back faulty pieces, and endlessly 
tested various peripherals and software 
packages to sort out compatibility pitfalls. 

AlX-IN-C^lE The PC Designs prepack- 
aged ET286i kit offers the more cautious 
approach. PC Designs evaluates and tests 
all the AT kit components and sells only 
those that meet its standards. The technical 
skills required for assembling an ET286i 
are the same as those required to upgrade a 
PC by adding a hard disk or to “repair” a 
PC or XT by swapping out a card or disk 
drive. If you can follow simple instruc- 
tions and can use a screwdriver, you can 
build the PC Designs kit in about 2 
hours — if all goes well, that is. And if 
things go wrong, as they did in my case. 



PC 

Designs 

The cost-effective PC 
Designs £7256/ kit 
contains (clockwise 
from top left): the PC 
chassis with the 
motherbiXird already 
installed, the power 
supply atul cable, an 
optional Imrd disk, a 
360K-byte floppy 
drive, anAT-style 
keyboard, 

docianentation, a disk 
controller card, afula 
moiUK'hrome graphics 
card with primer port. 
Missingfrom this 
picture is the 
momxhrome monitor. 





a 

Building the ET286i 
basically entails 
placing comfxtnents in 
the chassis and making 
the right c<fnneciion.s . 
The hard disk 
installation is shown 
here. Another 
important step in the 
prtK'ess involves 
.selecting proper 
configuration options 
on the motherlxHtrd. 
Minor differences 
between various 
display cards and 
serial and parallel port 
conflgurations entail 
different connections, 
as explained in the 
diHumentation. 


you have to deal with only one supplier. 

The ET286i boasts 100 percent plug- 
compatibility with the IBM PC AT and an 
identical footprint. It comes with a chassis, 
200-watt power supply, AT-style key- 
board, motherboard, cables, monochrome 
graphics/printer card, a Princeton Graph- 
ics MAX 1 2 amber monochrome monitor, 
a Western Digital high-performance hard 


and floppy disk controller, a half-height 
Omek floppy disk drive, and a bagful of 
the necessary fasteners. PC Designs sells 
the chassis with the motherboard and the 
disk controller already installed and tested. 
The 10-MHz configuration costs $2,400; 
the 8-MHz version is just $1 ,995. 

The machine comes standard with 1 
megabyte of memory, three serial ports. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
186 





a 

Completely assembletl. 
the BT2H6i is a dead 
rinffer for a PC A T. 
inside and outsule. 
Anyone who has 
installed Itard drives 
before should he able 
to build the tT2H6i in 2 
to 3 hours byfollowittft 
the detailed 
instruetions provided 
with every Idt. 


(although IX)S uses only two), two paral- 
lel ports, and six AT-style (16-bit) plus 
two PC-style (8-bit) expansion slots. The 
memory chips are 1 50-nanosecond de- 
vices, which is surprising because that is 
the speed used in a stock 6-MHz IBM PC 
AT. (Red River uses 120-nanosecond 
memory devices.) 

Enhancements available for the ET286i 
machine include a variety of Seagate and 
Core voice-coil hard disk drives; graphics 
adapters from Everex, ATI, and Hercules; 
PC Designs’ own EGA display (see review 
in this issue in “Achieving the Standard: 
12 EGA Boards"); Hayes-compatible mo- 
dems; tape-backup systems; and three dif- 
ferent Princeton monitors. 

If you’re dissatisfied, with the purchase, 
you may return the machine to PC Designs 
within 30 days for a full refund. The docu- 
mentation, though not especially well pro- 
duced or well organized, is thorough. The 
amount and quality of information con- 
tained in the manual is worthwhile in it- 
self. 

KEYBOARD-CONTROLLED SPEED 

The PC Designs motherboard uses the In- 
tel 80286-10 high-speed 16-bit processor 
chip. Pressing Ctrl-Shift-Alt-Del shifts the 
machine from a cruising speed of 6 MHz to 
its highest gear, 10 MHz. Keyboard-con- 


trolled speed is an especially nice feature 
because some software won’t allow you to 
boot at high speed, even though the pack- 
age will run at high speed. 

With its sights set on the future, the PC 
Designs motherboard is eminently confi- 
gurable. Jumpers allow you to use differ- 
ent kinds of memory chips and different 
sizes of ROM BIOS chips. The serial ports 
are configurable to RS-232, the current 
standard, or RS-422, an emerging stan- 
dard. 

Like any AT-compatible, the ET286i 
has a battery-powered parameter memory 
and clock. 'The parameter memory is used 
to record the hardware configuration (disk 
type, floppy type, display type, memory 
size) so that PC-DOS can behave appropri- 
ately. On an IBM PC AT, the setup section 
of the AT Diagnostics program (included 
in the AT User's Guide) is used to set the 
values in the parameter memory. On the 
ET286i, the ROM BIOS (made by ACS, a 
Texas firm) allows you to set the parameter 
memory as part of the booting prtxess. 
This significant convenience means that 
you don’t need to purchase IBM’s Ad- 
vanced Diagnostics to use the machine. 
(The regular AT Diagnostics program can- 
not be purchased separately.) 

At the time of my purchase, the lithium 
battery for the parameter memory was un- 



F A C T 


FILE 


ET286i 
PC[)esigns 
5837 S. Garnett 
Tulsa. OK 74146 
(918)252-5550 

Lfat Price: 6/10 MHz. S2.400: 6/8 MHz. 

SI ,995 (includes: AT-compatible BIOS with 
Setup program. I megabyte of RAM. three 
serial ports, two Centronics parallel ports, 
Princeton Graphics MAX 1 2 Amber Mono- 
chrome Disf^y. hi^-resdution mono- 
chrome gravies display card. Western Digi- 
tal combifiatkxi floppy arrd hard disk 
controller. 1 92-wattFoiiiim power supply, 
eight expansion slots, battery-backed-up 
CMOS calendar, choice of 360K or 1 .2 
Mbyte floppy disk drive. AT-style case arxl 
charts, AT-compatible keybot^). 

OptkNis: 80287 ct^trocessor. Core ATPtus 
and Seagate vmce-coil hard disk drives; 20-. 
60-. and lOO-Mbyte tape backups; Hayes- 
compatible modems; color monhois. 
MkroproccsBor: 80286 
Clock Speed: 6 and IOMHzor6and8MHz 
In Short: An easy-to-assemble. prepack- 
aged AT kit at an almost obscenely price. 

Completely AT compatible, espe^ly at 
lower clock speeds. 

CIRCLE aw ON H£ADeRSERV<C£ CARD 


available for the ET286i. Each time I 
turned the machine on, 1 had to reassign 
the parameter values. This is a prime ex- 
ample of the “I can’t get what I need” syn- 
drome that plagues the kit market: when 
you’re putting the pieces together yourself, 
you’re sure to be iiked by the unavailabili- 
ty of some significant fragment. 

Much of the process of assembling the 
ET286i involves inspection as opposed to 
construction. Checking to make sure ev- 
erything survived shipping is especially 
important when you’re assembling a kit. 
Once you’ve unpacked and taken inven- 
tory, the assembly begins. Just follow the 
clear, well-illustrated instructions. 

■ Select the monitor type by jumpering a 
pin connector on the motherboard. 

■ Connect the port interface cables from 
the motherboard to the rear-panel cutouts. 

■ Install and cormect the power supply to 
the motherboard. 

■ Install the speaker in the bracket pro- 
vided and connect it to the motherboard. 

■ Install the power LED and lithium bat- 
tery (once the battery is available) and con- 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
187 



CAVEAT EMPTOR 


Let the buyer beware! Unfortunately, the PC marketplace suffers from exaggerated claims, public relations hype 
and unfulfilled promises. That’s why we offer a FREE 30-day evaluation of Diagraph. No demo disks or slick 
sleight of hand presentations but the actual product, yours to use for 30 days with no obligation whatsoever. 

So if you’re looking for business graphics software to produce professional-quality organization charts, forms, 
diagrams, signs, maps and flow charts, we think Diagraph is the best solution and here are three reasons why. 



Symbols 

Diagraph comes com- 
plete with over 2,200 
"clip-art” symbols of 
the highest quality. 


The competition offers 
you a few hundred symbols that don’t 
even come close but see for yourself. 


Diagraph Competitor A 


Diagraph Competitor B 

In addition to the 2,200 symbols 
included with Diagraph, 3,000 op- 
tional symbols and company logos 
are also available. 

The competition invites you to draw 
your own. Ever try to draw a car, a 
telephone, a satellite or a computer 
by hand? Worse yet, try drawing 
them on a PC — working against a 
deadline. 





2 Typefaces 

Diagraph offers 
you a choice of 
^ dozens of high- 
resolution, solid- 
filled typefaces 
including inter- 
national characters. The competition 
uses a predetermined number of 
straight lines to form their typefaces. 
Used in titles at the size shown 
below, their characters appear crude 
and ill-formed. 



Competitor B Diagraph 



Competitor A Diagraph 


Our high-resolution typefaces are 
professional-quality for professional 
presentations. 



FjexiWllty__ 

Diagraph offers 
you many capa- 
bilities not found 
in other products. 


Most products 

won’t allow you to stretch text in any 
direction, insert tokens when drawing 
lines or rotate symbols. 


STRETdt^ 





Before you consider any other pro- 
duct, we suggest that you try to align 
symbols (top, bottom, left, right), 
align text, window text inside a 
symbol, change one symbol to an- 
other (without having to first delete 
the symbol and add a new symbol). 
Then decide which product is the 
most flexible . 

Diagraph does it all — quickly and 
easily for only $395. 


These are just 1-2-3 of the reasons we’re sure that at the end of 30 days you will have discovered so many uses for 
Diagraph that you won’t want to part with it. For even more reasons to buy Diagraph and additional information 
about our 30-day evaluation program, mail the attached business reply card today. 

Diagraph is available for the IBM PC/XT/AT, IBM 3270 PC/AT, IBM compatibles and HP desktop computers. The 
IBM Enhanced Graphics Adapter (EGA) and a wide variety of printers, plotters and film recorders are supported. 


IBM isa registered trademark of International Business Machines Corporation. Diagraph is a registered trademark licensed to Computer Support Corporation. 


ComguterSuggortCor^ratiM 


2215 Midway Road • Carrollton, Texas 75006 » 214/661-8960 


CIRCLE 254 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


■ BUILD-YOUR-OWNAT 


figure the cabling for the ports. 

■ Insert and attach the floppy and hard 
disk drives. 

■ Attach the keyboard and monitor. 

Then plug in the machine and take it for 

a spin. 

After entering the setup information as 
prompted from the machine's BIOS, you 
can Ixxit the system with DOS 3. 1 . Run 
the FDISK and FORMAT programs from 
the floppy and you're off on a high-speed 
AT adventure. 

For reasons still unclear to me, my first 
PC Designs ET286i (it was also one of the 


■ The most exhausting 
part of putting together 
the Red River 
Technology system was 
dealing with the 
various product sources. 


company's first production units) never i 
worked properly. In a most accommodat- j 
ing manner, PC Designs supplied me (part 
by part) with a new power supply and then ! 
a new floppy disk drive. Still, inexplicable 
crashes occurred and infamous ‘'Parity ' 
Check” messages appeared at irregular in- i 
tervals. PC Designs sent the motherboard | 
back to the manufacturer (ACS), which re- | 
placed the "high speed" chips. The ma- i 
chine was still unreliable, so PC Designs 
supplied a brand new ET286i kit from its 
stock. The machine worked perfectly until 
I tried to strap, or connect, the hard disk. 
Again. PC Designs came to my rescue and 
figured out, finally, that Seagate had 
changed the disk pinouts. The process was 
inconvenient, but I was never alone. When 
you buy the ET286i, you also appear to 
buy access to a service troubleshooter. 
(The company knew I was reviewing its 
computer kit and is unlikely to give such 
devoted personal attention to every cus- 
tomer. Still, the support I got was above 
and beyond what I expected, a good sign 
inasmuch as technical support can be as 


l| i ! L 

B E N C H M 

ARK T 

E S T S 


PC Designs ET286i vs. 
IB.M PC AT 

ET286i (6 MHz) 

1 1 Hard disk 

1 1 Floppy disk 

ET286i (10 MHz) 

1 1 Hard disk 

■ Floppy disk 



IBM PC AT 16 MHz) E3 Hart disk 

□ Floppy disk 


Disk I O 

-M- 


90\- 




512 Bytes 578 Bytes 

120 


All times are given m seconds 
and decimal seconds 


'4 







The Disk Input Output benchmark lest measures the time it takes lo create a 200K^e data file using record lengths o( 

■■ ' " • -- - ' ‘ 'lie. lokowed 


512 bytes and 578 bytes 1 
by a seouential read of the 



The Prime Number Calcu- 
lation benchmark test mea- 
sures the speed at which the 
computer can find all the 
prime numbers between 1 
vidSO 

The Compiler Routtne 


( ASM), converts it to binary 
code , and knk -edits It with 
other binary hies to make 
an executable (.EXE) file 
Stage 2 coiTpiies and Iir3ks 
source code to resolve ad- 
dress references and make 
an executable fife 


the speed of program devei- 
opment m the mrcroproc e s- 
sor and RAM by way of 8 
Nw>-step. seti-timing DOS 
batch hie using the IBM 
Personal Computer bnker 
program Stage 1 takes a 
341-hne assembly code file 


how Quickty the machme 
reads and writes to dtsk by 
perforrning a senes of disK- 
mtensive d8AS£ n. \%r$ion 
2-41. tasks. The sett-timing 


DOS batch file runs a total 
of SIX dBASE routines on 81 
individual database records 
consisting of 154 bytes each 
sorting on a database file 
(.D6Fi. indexing on 2 of the 
13 data fields m each rec- 
ord. copying lo a temporary 
database fito. setting two 
indexes on a database Me. 
appendmg a record, and 
deleting a record and pack- 
no (or removing the data 
hole from) the mtabase file 

The 1-2-3 Routine bench- 


mark test tor spreadsheet 
appications. designed for a 
640K'byte environment, as- 
sesses the computational 
speed and RAM manage- 
ment capabikbes of the ma- 
chine by using a 1-2-3 macro 
that performs a senes of 
both global and ndividual 
worksheet (asks The macro 
copies and recalculates a 
10^ range 49d times, 
moves i.0do ceSs. deieies 
1000 cels, and then sys- 
lemaiically clears the 
spreadsheet 


The PC Desifins ET286i shows blazing speed on the applications tests at both 6 and 10 Mhz. The 
disk ilO tasks, however, suggest pttor integration betyveen drive and controller: in the write and 
sequential read tests, the ET286i‘s performance actually deteriorates at the higher speed. 


difficult for established product reviewers 
to obtain as it is for others). 

RED RIVERS ATTAS The start from- 
scratch approach is more complicated and 
fraught with potential difficulties — as well 
as with opportunities to customize. Red 
River offers its state-of-the-art ATlas tech- 
nology in many configurations (see side- 
bar “Motherboard Options from Red Riv- 
er Technology*’); the price of each option 


and the amount of time you must invest in 
construction varies accordingly. 

Buying a motherboard and then pur- 
chasing separate components involves 
heavy telephone work. 1 spent 5 days rack- 
ing up long-distance bills and securing 
price and product information before or- 
dering a single item. The most exhausting 
part of putting together the Red River sys- 
tem was dealing with the various product 
sources. In all, I obtained the mother- 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
191 



IBMisthefether. 



Copyrighted material 



But wete the mothers 
Mdio do all the work. 





IDEAcomm 5250/ Remote, Feb. 1986 


IDEAcomm 2400. Jan. 1986 


IDEAcomm 3270 SNA/BSC. Mar. 1985 


Diskit 2. Feb. 1986 



IDEA Supermax/EMS, April 1986 




Overboard. July 1986 


In 1981, IBM fathered a new breed of computer and 
called it personal (or PC for short). 

In 1982 we not only started a company devoted totally 
to that personal computer, but stayed close to home and 
brought the little PC up. 

We were first to devise a fully functional link between 
the IBM PC and the System 3X minicomputers. First to ex- 
pand the PC’s on-line storage and backup with removable 
Winchester cartridges. And we aeated the industry stand- 
ard in backplane design for multifunction boards. 

As you know, we’re not the only ones who make 
products for the IBM PC. What you probably don’t know 


is that all our products are developed by our own 
research and development team. 

You see, our corporate commitment is to do more 
than enhance the IBM PC. It’s to genuinely advance it. 
Expanding memory, communications, graphics and 
disk capabilities. 

We’re IDEA. And if you want to know what’s really 
happening with the IBM PC, don’t call the father. 

Call the mother. At 800-257-5027. 

IDEAssociates 


IDEAssociales. Inc., 29 Dunham Road. Billerica. MA 01821. (617) 663*6878. Telex 4979780; France. Switzerland. Germany. United Kincdum. 
IBM IS a registered trademark of International Business Machines Corporation. All product names above are trademarks of IDEAssociates. Inc. 

CIRCLE 333 ON READER SERVICE CARD 











o 





All Aboard.’ EGA or mono/color graphics, 
hard disk controller, serial and parallel ports, plus clock on one board 


What do you do when you buy 
an IBM XT and you want more 
power and versatility? You buy 
more boards. 

Problem is, the more you buy, 
the more you spend. And the more 
XT board slots you fill up. 

Well, we have a better way to use an XT. 
With All Aboard and Overboard. Two cards for 
the IBM XT. Each utilizes surface mount tech- 
nology to give you all the functions on one board 
that you’d typically find on four. So you get every- 
thing you need in a single slot— and a single 
purchase. With open spaces for future options. 

All Aboard is the first to combine mono/ 
color or EGA graphics, 2MB of EMS memory, 
multifunction capability and a disk controller. 

It is the right card to buy if you are 


installing a hard disk. 

If you don’t need a disk 
controller. Overboard is the 
perfect alternative. This short 
card is double-sided to com- 
bine graphics and multifunction 
capability for the XT, AT and 
even the IBM PC. 

Now when you buy an XT, you have only 
one decision to make. You can go All Aboard. 
Or you can go Overboard. Either way, you go 
with the company that’s perfecting PC technol- 
ogy while the competition is merely talking 
about it. IDEAssociates. 

Call 800-257-5027. 

IDEAssociates 



(Kerboard.' EGA or mono/color graphics, - 
serial and parallel ports, plus clock " 
on a short card. 


IDEAssociates. Inc., 29 Dunham Road, BillerKa. MA 01821, <617) 663-6878, Telex 4979780; France, Switzerland, Germany. Cnited Kingdom. 
IBM IS a rostered trademark of International Business Machines Corporation. All Aboard and O>‘erboard are trademarks of A^EAssociates. Inc. 


CIRCLE 354 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



■ BUILD-YOUR-OWNAT 


MOTHERBOARD OPTIONS 
FROM RED RIVER TECHNOLOGY 


B uying an assembled motherboard 
and then building your own personal 
computer system guarantees a more flex- 
ible and personal machine — one, for ex- 
ample, that emphasizes graphics or sci- 
entific applications. Red River 
Technology offers its ATlas board in sev- 
eral stages of completeness at a variety of 
prices. Based on my own skills and 
“time is money” criteria, I choose op- 
tion 3. How about you? 

Option 1: The adventurous PC user can 
purchase the naked ATlas itxrtheiboard, 
called the ATlas Bare Board Kit. The na- 
ked board is just that — a PC board with- 
out anything soldered in and without any 
components. You have to track down 
and purchase the chips and components 
before you lift the soldering iron. 

Option 2: The next level is a naked 
motherboard plus a complete set of com- 
ponents — the ATlas Basic Kit or the AT- 
las Complete Kit. You still have to solder 
the pieces, but at least you have all the 
parts to work with. My memories of sol- 
dering my old CP/M system (a relatively 
simple two-layer board) are not pleasant, 
and new multilayer boards are even more 
difficuh to solder. 

Options 1 and 2 should only be con- 
sider^ if you have experience with a sol- 
dering iron, experience working with 
(and debugging) sophisticated electron- 
ics, and access to test equipment such as 
the Scope and Logic analyzer. 

Option 3: The Red River Technology as- 
sembled and tested motherboard (the 
ATlas Board) offers a much more realis- 
tic level of kit building for most PC users . 
The board is guaranteed to work, and 
connectable components are available 
from numerous suppliers. Red River 
supplies a working motherboard; you 


FACT FILE 


ATlas Boud Kits 
Red River Technology 
4001 W. Airport Freeway, #500 
Bedford. TX 76201 
(817)571-5714 

List Prioe: ATItb Ban Board Kit, $199 
(includes printed circuit board, manual, 
and assembly insmictions). ATba Basic 
Kk, $595 (itKludes printed circuit board, 
five gate arrays. 8-MHz 80286 CPU chips, 
manual, and assembly mstnictions). Allas 
BIOS, $69 (includes PC AT-«ompalible 
BIOS plus 8742 with keyboard BIOS). 
ATlas Complele Kk, $749 (includes all 
parts to build a standard ATlas board in- 
cluding gate arrays, 8-MHz 80286, all con- 
nector sockets, ITL, and discrete pans, 
with manual and assembly insmictions). 
ATlas Complete Kit with BIOS, $795 
(includes ali (earutes of the ATlas Com- 
plele Kit plus the ATlas BIOS). ATlas 
Board for PC, PC-XT, or PC AT, $ 1 ,595 
(6.8.and IOMHz)or$1.295(6and8 
MHz) (includes six expansion slots and 
connectorspacing). ATIaoSystem, $2,195 
(8 MHz) or $3 ,095 ( 10 MHz) (itKludes an 
Alias board with six I/O expansion slots, 
AT-compatible case and power supply, 
disk coupler for floppy and bard disk, 

1 .2-Mbyte floppy, AT-coaipalible key- 
board, OK serial and OIK poraliel port, fully 
assembled and tested bo^). 

CIBClEeatONnEADBtSgtVICECABO 


have to supply everything else: case, 
power supply, keybo^, disk controller, 
disk drives, video display card, and vid- 
eo display monitor. 

Option 4: Like PC Designs, Red River 
also sells a completely assembled pre- 
tested machine, c^ed the ATlas Sys^m. 
Red River stands behind every compo- 
nent; all you need to do is write a single 
check. — Robin Raskin 



board, a chassis, power supply, disk con- 
troller and floppy disk, hard disk, and key- 
board from six different companies — and 
dealt with six sets of promises and prob- 
lems, It took me well over 2 months to se- 
cure what 1 needed. 

Finding someone willing to sell a single 
AT motherboard is like trying to buy one 
egg at the supermarket. Numerous compa- 
nies sell AT motherboards, but Red River 
Technology is one of the few that is willing 
to sell only one. Red River's ATlas Board, 
with AT specifications and an XT foot- 
print, is a smart choice for anyone consid- 
ering upgrading an XT, as well as for those 
who, for whatever reason, want to build a 
brand-new machine. The board also is at- 
tractive because it uses Chips and Technol- 
ogies’ PC AT-compatible CHlPSet (see 
sidebar “The CHlPSet Difference”), an 
innovative design that has had a major im- 
pact on the cost of new AT alternatives. 

The ATlas motherboard runs at three 
speeds (6, 8, and 10 MHz), but unlike the 
ET286i, it won’t let you change speeds 
midstream; you must select the speed be- 
fore you turn on the machine. The speed- 
select switch, like any switch on a PC 
motherboard, is hard to reach. 

The ATlas comes with half a megabyte 
of memory; if you want to expand the 
memory to 1 megabyte without using a 
slot, a piggyback memoryboard is avail- 
able. The memory chips were rated at 120 
nanoseconds, which seems appropriate for 
a high-speed machine. The most promi- 
nent components on the motherboard are 
the five big chips that make up the Cilhips 
and Technologies CHlPSet, which are as 
impressive looking as the 286 micro- 
processor itself. 

Less generous than the ACS board in 
the PC Designs machine, the ATlas moth- 
erboard has only one serial port and one 
parallel port. Three of its six slots are PC 
style and three are AT style. The battery- 
powered RAM works just like the one in 
an IBM PC AT. The Setup program of the 
AT Advanced Diagnostics is used to con- 
figure the machine. (Figure $295 for 
IBM’s Advanced Diagnostics into your 
system cost.) 

Because of the power-saving features 
of the CHlPSet, the ATlas will work with a 
power supply as small as 135 watts, al- 
though you may need (or want) a larger 


one if you are using power-hungry periph- 
eral cards. The ATlas motherboard will fit 
into a PC or an XT chassis, but many of the 
AT expansion boards you’ll want to install 
are too tall to fit into a PC chassis. Fortu- 


nately, the Soletek XT chassis that 1 pur- 
chase is as tall as an AT chassis. 

1 added a DTC hard/floppy high-perfor- 
mance disk controller, a Seagate 3()-mega- 
byte hard disk, and a Tandon floppy drive. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
1% 



One board runs IBM. 



One board runs the IBM AT 


Presenting the chief operating board of the IBM AT. 

IDEA Supemiax/EMS. The only multifunction card for the 
AT with 4MB of RAM to support expanded, extended and 
conventional memory. Along with three standard I/O ports, 
two serial and one parallel. 

Its expanded memory is compatible with software 
written to the Lotus/Intel/Microsoft’'' specification. So you’re 
able to juggle large spreadsheets and databases at lightning 
speed. In addition, IDEA Supermax software gives you print 
spooling from expanded memory. 


And, if you choose, you can use the 4MB of RAM 
as extended memory to create a virtual disk, or work in a 
XENIX* environment. IDEA Supermax works with both 6 
and 8 MHz/ATs. 

It took one board to create the IBM AT, but it takes 
another board to master it. IDEA Supermax/EMS. 

Call 800-257-5027 for more information. 

IDEAssociates 


IDEAstocutei. Inc., 29 DurJum Ro»d. Billerica. MA01B21. (617)663-6878. Telex 4979780 
*IBM. Lotus, Intel. Microeoft and XE.VIX reregistered iradenarks oflnteniatnnal Business Machines Corporation. Lotus Development 
Corpontkn, Intel Corporation, and Microsoft Corpoation. respectively. IDEA Supermax/'EMSisatrademarkol IDEAssociates. Inc. 


CIRCLE 335 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



With Diskit 2 Plus, this is what intruders 



Copyrighted material 



see when they try to steal your data. 



Now there is an impenetrable device that secures computer 
data and leaves intruders in the dark. 

Diskit 2 Plus. The only removable disk drive that incor- 
porates hardware-based DES encryption. The one encryp- 
tion system approved by the National Bureau of Standards. 

Unlike software-based encryption, Diskit 2 Plus can’t 
be broken into. Only the person who knows the key 
can gain access. And there’s no need to lock up removable 
media if you’re the only one who can read it. 

Diskit 2 Plus features advanced backup software. You 
can back one 10 Mb cartridge to another in just three 
minutes. What’s more, unlike other drives that use floppy- 
based media, our proprietary controller design ensures 
flawless data transfer— even onto imperfect media. 


And just like our Diskit 2 drive, Diskit 2 Plus fits right 
under your PC monitor for zero footprint. 

No other disk drive looks like it, or acts like it. Diskit 2 
Plus with DES encryption. 

What others can’t see, can’t hurt you. 


IDEAssodates 


Call 800-257-5027 for more information on Diskit 2 Plus. 

CIRCLE 337 ON READER SERVICE CARD 
DEAssociates Inc., 29 Dunham Road. Billerica, MA 01821 (617) 663-6878 Telex 4979780: France. Switzerland. United Kingdom, Germany. Diskit 2 Plus is a trademark of IDEAssodates Inc. 



■ BUILD-YOUR-OWNAT 



Red River 
Technology 

Red River 
Technolofiy's ATlas 
motherbtkird is a thing 
of beauty. Ba.sedon 
Chips and 

Technologies' PC AT- 
cotnjHttihle CHlPSet. 
the board uses 5 chips 
to replace the .16 chips 
on IBM's PC AT 
motherboard. The 
hoard Jits into an XT 
chtcssis — a real plus 
for XT users who 
want to upgrade 
their machines. 


For some of the testing, I used a Hercules 
Color Card, but I also tried out the ATI 
Monographics card and several EGA 
cards. 

I placed everything in a sturdy, well- 
built Soletek flip-top XT chassis, along 
with a 135-watt power supply also pur- 
chased from Soletek. Since the ATlas 
motherboard has an XT footprint, I or- 
dered an XT chassis just to see an AT-class 
motherboard in an old-style box. The 
board also fits into an AT chassis, un- 
doubtedly a better way to go if you are as- 
sembling a machine from scratch. Your 
choice of chassis should take into account 
the peripherals you plan to mount. An XT 


■ Holding my breath, 


I connected the 


power supply, speaker, 
CMOS battery, and 


keyboard to the ATlas 
motherboard. The 
speaker beeped politely. 

or PC has screw holes on the side of the 
disk drives to attach them to the chassis. 
AT disk drives slide into the chassis on 
side-mounted rails and are secured by a 
screw in front. 

ASSEMBLING HUMPTY DUMPIY 

Unlike the purchasing process, the assem- 
bly of my system was a refreshing breeze. 
Again, I unpacked and carefully inspected 
everything, this time with even more cau- 
tion because I knew that no equivalent of 
the PC Designs troubleshooting team 
would be standing by to take my call or 
hold my hand. 

I held my breath until I actually saw the 
ATlas board slip into that XT chassis. But 
before actually installing the board, I test- 
ed the parts on my tabletop. While the PC 
Designs manual told all, the Red River 
material included plenty of information 
about the board but nothing about connect- 


Days spent .scouring 
advertisements and 
investigating options 
resulted in the makings 
'of a high 

performanceilow cost 
machine. Shown here 
are IcltH-kwisefrom top 
left!: Solotek flip-top 
chassis with the Red 
River ATlas 
motherhtxird. which I 
installed, in place: 
power supply: 20- 
megabyte hard disk 
drive: 360K-hyte 
floppy drive: 
kcybtHird: battery and 
speaker: and disk 
controller card. 


power supply, speaker, CMOS battery, 
and keyboard to the motherboard. The 
speaker beeped politely. 

■ More assertively, 1 then connected the 
display card and display. Success. When I 
turned on the monitor, it displayed the 
memory-check messages. 

■ Connecting the disk controller card and 
the floppy required some inventiveness. 


ing it anywhere. I was glad to have the as- 
sembled ET286i as a visual guide. Anyone 
attempting to build from parts should ei- 
ther memorize the inside of an AT or have 
one close by for reference. 

The considerably more dramatic build- 
ing scenario for the ATlas went something 
like this: 

■ Holding my breath, I connected the 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
200 



Assembled, ihe Red 
River ATlas-hwied 
machine essentially 
contains the .same 
componenis as the PC 
Designs machine, and 
it also takes about 2 
hours to assemble. 
Selecting your own 
components gi ves you a 
more customized 
machine for 
appro.ximately the 
same price, hut 
ordering ami waiting 
for parts — which can 
take weeks and 
weeks — requires 
patience and a sense of 
adventure. 


The connectors on the controller card are 
numbered, but the DTC manual (a pro- 
grammer's dream, a user's nightmare) 
doesn't give any clues as to which number 
is which. According to the DTC manual, 
the connectors are keyed; mine weren't. 
Neither were the corresponding cables. 

■ I correctly assumed the orientation 
would be the same as for the PC Designs 
Western Digital controller. I turned on the 
system and watched the memory diagnos- 
tics and floppy disk access light spring into 
action. The floppy drive's motor didn't 
turn on, and I experienced my first boot 
failure. It took a fbw minutes to discover 
that the floppy didn't work because I had 
assembled all the components on static- 
free bubble plastic. I'd become a fanatic 
about static electricity, but the bumpy sur- 
face of the bubble plastic kept the drive's 
flywheel from spinning. 

■ I moved the floppy to smoother quar- 
ters and booted the system using IBM Ad- 
vanced Diagnostics to configure it. I 
guessed the disk type configurations — 
again based on my documented experience 
with the PC Designs. Then I b^ed to 
DOS from the floppy. 

■ Finally I instiled and formatted the 
hard disk, copied the system files onto the 
hard disk, and rebooted. At this point, my 
ATlas AT was still a tabletop operation. 


■ The question of what 
expansion board works in 
what system ought to be 
posed to victims of the 
next Spanish Inquisition. 


■ To install the components, 1 measured 
the fpotprint of the motherboard and bolted 
the appropriate standoffs into the chassis. 
Since the Soletek chassis, like the ATlas 
motheiboard, is designed for numerous 
configurations, it is a true challenge to find 
a matching set of mounting holes. Next, I 
bolted the motherboard and power supply 
onto the chassis. 

■ Determined to be meticulous, I tried 
everything again with the disks still free- 
standing and plug-in boards wobbling be- 
cause the card guides weren't in place. 

■ My greatest confusion arose in assem- 
bling the front card guide/speaker holder. 
There were multiple screw holes and no in- 
structions. The PC Designs kit arrived 
with all the brackets in place; with the So- 


y^FACT FILE 


Red River ATIas-based System 
List Price: $1 .823-$2.615. Tested mother- 
board: 6/8 MHz. $1,295; 6/8/10 MHz. 

$1 .595. Stilctck chassis; XT size. $60; AT 
size, $110. Power supply; 130 watts. $90; 
200 watts, $130. Keyboiutl: $100. AT disk 
contn)llcr; $300. Roppy disk drive: $I(K). 
Monochrome adapter; $100. Monochrome 
monitor $180. (See sidebar “Motherboard 
Options from Red River Technology*’ for 
more-specific information on the Red River 
ATlas molhertxjard; see sidebar “Where to 
Find AT Components” for more informatittn 
on other components. ) 

Microprocessor: 80286 

Clock Speed: 6. 8. and 10 MHz or 6 and 8 

MHz. 

In Short: A highly customized AT-compati- 
ble machine that is only slightly more compli- 
cated to assemble than a kit. Obtaining the 
componenis from various suppliers requires 
persistence and patience. 

C-tCLt 664 ON READER SERVICE CAFID 


letek chassis, assembling the brackets was 
a lesson in trial and engineering. 

■ With the parts in place and ^nctioning, 
the end was in sight. I began to fasten and 
clamp everything down. 

HARDWARE COMPATIBILITY The 

question of what expansion board works in 
what system ought to be posed to the vic- 
tims of the next Spanish Inquisition. In 
theory, any board that works in an IBM PC 
AT should work in a compatible system 
ranning at 6 MHz. I tried the Hercules Col- 
or Card, the ATI Monographics card, the 
ATI EGA, the Video Vega EGA, the IBM 
EGA, the Microsoft Bus Mouse, the Intel 
AboveBoard AT, and the PC Network 
Adapter. All of these cards appeared to op- 
erate flawlessly on both machines at 6 
MHz. 

The dizzying world of 10 MHz is more 
confusing. Many expansion boards won't 
work on an IBM machine at 10 MHz, al- 
though most do woik at 8 MHz. (The stan- 
dard IBM PC crawls along at 4.77 MHz, 
and the standard AT manages only 6. 
Some AT-compatibles and the newest ver- 
sion of the IBM PC AT clip along at 8.) 

With the ATI Monographics card in- 
stalled in the ATlas Technology mother- 
board, 1 encountered several parity-check 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
201 


\ * 


Marvdousmi 


denotes IBM-AT compatibility, 
denotes IBM-PCjr compatibility. 

(call for specific requirements) 

SOFTWARE 

We only carry the latest versions of products. 
Version numbers in our ads are current at 
press time. 


Alpha Software (not copy-protected) 

*^Keyworks2.0 $49, 

Ashton-Tate (copy-protected) 

-dBase III Plus 1 .0 call 

-Framework II 1.0 call 

Best Programs (not copy-protected) 

PC Connection 1 5-day money back guarantee 
on these Best Programs. 

-Professional Finance Program 4.0 149. 

-PC/Fixed Asset System 3.1 299. 

Bible Research (not copy-protected) 

*-THEWORD3.1 fKJVe/b/eJ 159. 

*-THEWORD3.UA//V8/b/e; 159. 

Borland International (not copy-protected) 

★ -Turbo Tutor 1.0 19. 

★ -Turbo Database Toolbox 1.2 33. 

★ -Turbo Graphix Toolbox 1,0 33. 

★ -Turbo Editor Toolbox 1.0 41. 

★ -Turbo Gameworks 1.0 37. 

★ -Turbo Newpakf'Gameworks and Ed/for} .. 52. 

-Turbo Lightning 57. 

★ -Sidekick 1.5 51. 

★ -Traveling Sidekick freq. S/dek/ckj 45. 

★ -Traveling Sidekick w/Sidekick 73. 

★ -Reflex 1.1 59. 

★ -Superkey 1.1 41, 

★ -Superkey/Sidekick Package 67. 

★ -Turbo Pascal 3.0 41. 

★ -Turbo Prolog 1.0 65. 

★ -Turbo Family Jumbo Pack 135. 

BPI Accounting Software 
(not copy-protected) 

-General Accounting C. 13 299. 

-Business Builder 399, 

Breakthrough (not copy-protected) 

-Timeline 2.0 239. 

Broderbund (copy-protected) 

★ -Graphics Library 1 22. 

★ -Print Shop 35. 

Computer Associates (not copy-protected) 

-SuperCalc 3 Release 2.1 call 

Dac Software (not copy-protected) 

-Dac Easy Word 32. 

-Dac Easy Payroll 32. 

★ -Dac Easy Accounting 45. 

Decision Resources (copy-protected) 

★ -Sign-Master 5.1 157, 

-Diagram-Master 5.0 207. 

★ -Chart-Master 6.1 237. 

★ -Map)-Master 1.0 245, 

Executive Systems (not copy-protected) 

-XTREE 2.0 (file & directory manage^;) 37. 

5th Generation (copy-profecfed!) 
-Fastback5.03 97. 


PC Connection 
Software Special 

through August 31 . 1986 

TRUE BASIC, INC. 

-True BASIC Fireworks Bundle 

Get the Compiler along with 3 libraries for a 
dynamite price. PC Tech Journal calls True 
BASIC "the language of choice." 

Package includes; 

• True BASIC 

• Developer’s Toolkit 

• PC BASIC Converter 

• 3D Graphics Library 


ForthelBM-PC.XTandAT $159. 


Funk Software (not copy-protected) 

★ -Sideways3.il 39. 

Graphic Communications 

- Freelance (not copy-protected) 199. 

Great American Software 

(not copy-protected) 

-One Write Plus 1.01 159. 

Harvard Associates (not copy-protected) 

★ -PC LOGO 2.0 89. 

Infocom (not copy-protected) 

-Cornerstone 5.1 65. 

Lifetree (not copy-protected) 

★ -VolkswriterS 1.0 147. 

Living Videotext 

-ThinkTank2.1 (copy-profecfedj 105. 

^Ready ^ .0 (not copy-protected) 49. 

Micro Education (MECA) (copy-protected) 

★ -Managing Your Money 2.0 115. 

-Managing the Market 79. 

MIcropro (not copy-protected) 

★ -WordStar 3.31 179. 

-WordStar Propak 3.31 259. 

-WordStar 20(X) Plus Release 2 285. 

Microrim (not copy-protected) 

-Extended Report Writer 1.3 85. 

-Clout2.0 135. 

-R:base50001.01 359. 

Microsoft (not copy-protected) 

-Windov/s 1.01 65. 

-Multiplan2.0 119. 

-Microsoft Word 3.0 247. 

★ -Microsoft Project 2,0 239. 

★ -Microsoft Chart 2.0 197. 


The following Microsoft mice now come with 
PC Paintbrush 3.0 software: 

-Microsoft Bus Mouse with Software 5.0 . . 135. 
* -Microsoft Serial Mouse with software 5.0 . 135. 


LANGUAGES 

-Quick Basic 1 .02 69. 

★ -Macro Assembler 4.0 105. 

-Pascal Compiler 3.31 175. 

-Fortran Compiler 3.31 205. 

-Basic Compiler 5.36 235. 

★ -C Compiler 3.0 235. 


Microstuf (not copy-protected) 

★ -Crosstalk XVI 3.61 $95. 

-Remote 1.3 95. 

Mlgent Software (not cop)r-profecfed[) 

-Ability 1 .OA 65. 

MultiMate International (not copy-protected) 

★ -MultiMate3.31 c^l 

-MultiMate Advantage 3.6 269. 

Nantucket Software (copy-protected) 

-Clipper (Winter '85 version) 349. 

Paperback Software (copy-protected) 

★ -VP-Planner1.0 57. 

*-VP-lnfo1.0 57. 

Peter Norton (not copy-protected) 

★ -Norton Commander 1.0 36. 

★ -Norton UtilitiesS.1 59. 

Powerbase (not copy-protected) 

-Powerbase2.2 189. 

Quarterdeck (not copy-protected) 

-DESQView1.2 65. 

Satellite Software (not copy-protected) 

★ -WordPerfect 4.1 239. 

Simon & Schuster (not copy-protected) 

★ -Webster's New World Speller 1.2 39. 

Softstyle (not copy-protected) 

★ -Printworks 1.05 39. 

★ -Printworks Laser 2.0 69. 

Software Group (not copy-protected) 

-Enable 1.1 call 

Software Publishing (copy-protected) 

★ -PFSiReport B:01 77. 

★ -PFS:FileB:01 84. 

★ -PFS:GraphB:01 84. 

*-PFS:WriteC;01 84. 

-Harvard Presentation Graphics 245. 

-HarvardTotal Project Manager 1.1 289. 

Not copy-protect^ versions due to be released 
soon-^call. 

Springboard (copy-protected) 

★ -Newsroom 35. 

★ -Clip Art Volume 1 (for Newsroom) 19. 

★ -Clip Art Volume 2 j'/br Newsroom) 25. 

True BASIC, Inc. (not copy-protected) 

★ -True BASIC 109. 

-True BASIC Fireworks Bundle special 

Unison (copy-protected) 

★ -Art Gallery 1 22. 

★ -Printmasterl.1 37. 

VM Personal Computing (bofcopy-profecfed!) 
Relay 93. 


TRAINING 

ATI (copy-protected) 

★ ^SKILL BUILDER PROGRAMS 

Intro and How to Use: 

PC-DOS MS-DOS 

Compaq Typing Tutor 

IBM-PC BASIC each 33. 

★ - TRAINING POWER PROGRAMS 

How to Use; 

Lotus 1-2-3 WordPerfect dBase III Plus 

WordStar Displaywrite 3 

Symphony each 43. 


For the IBM-PC (XT & AT) exclusively. 



CTO modifiers. 


Individual Software (copy-protected) 

♦ .^The Instructor II $26. 

♦ .-Professor DOS 33. 

♦ .-Tutorial Set fbof/) /terns abovej 49. 

♦ .-Typing Instructor 26. 

♦ .-Training for Lotus 1 -2-3 (for vers. 1A&2) . . 37. 

♦ .-Training for dBase III 37. 

♦ --Training for Project Management 49. 

Scarborough Systems (copy-protected) 

♦ MasterType 26. 

Simon & Schuster (not copy-protected) 

♦ --Typing Tutor III 33. 


EDUCATIONAL 


PC Connection 
Hardware Special 

through August 31. 1966 

HAYES MICROCOMPUTER PRODUCTS 

• --Smartmodem 2400 and --24008 

Hayes modems are the industry standard 
for all the right reasons— reliable products, 
knowledgeable support people. 2 year 
warranty. For all this, you usually have to 
pay a premium price, but take a look! 

Features: 

• 300/1200/2400 baud operation 

• Compatible with Bell 103, Bell 21 2A, and 
CCITTV.22BIS 

e Works with Hayes AT command set 

• Switchless configuration 

• SyrKJhronous or asynchronous 
communication 

• Externa) modem requires software and 
cable 

2400 External $559. 

2400 Internal fw/Smartcom//) $499. 


HARDWARE 

Manufacturer’s minimum limited warranty 
period is listed after each company name. Some 
products in their line may have longer warranty 
periods. 


AST Research ... 1 to 2 years 

SixPakPlus 64k indudes Sidekick ve/s. 1.5 

not copy-protected & DESQViev/ $169. 

SixPakPlus 384k (fultv populated) 219. 

SixPackPremium 512k C/S/P upgrades to 
1 Meg. fuSy compatible w/(h LOTUS/INTEL 
exparided merTK)ry specification (EMS) . . . . 369. 
AST 3G Video Disolav Board 256k 

(EGA compatible) 349. 

.- AST-5251 -11 579. 

- Advantage 128k upgradeable to 1.5 Meg 
includes Sidekick version 1.5 not 

copy-protected 369. 

RAMpaoe! upgrades to 2Mb call 

.- RAMoaoe! AT upgrades to 2Mb c^l 

Both RAMpage boards support EMS and fuUy 
support EEMS. 

Amdek ... 2 years 

--Video 31 OA morn) monitor /’ambed 159. 

♦ --Color 722 -RGB /EGA compat/bfe^ 519. 

Compucable ... lifetime 

Plastic Keyboard & Drive Cover Set 15. 

--IBM Mono Screen Enhancement 17. 

Cuesta ... 1 year 
Uninterruptable power backup units 

.-Datasaver 400 WATT cdl 

Curtis ... lifetime 
ACCESSORIES 

♦ --Low Profile Tilt and Swivel Pedestal 25. 

--PC Pedestal (for /SMA^ono or Cotod 27. 

Portable Pedestal (for porfabfe computers^. . 36. 

--Printer Stand 18. 

System Stand (for /fl/W-PC 4X7} 19. 

♦ --Universal System Stand 25. 

-•Crystal 300 WATT (Ifoe conditioner) ...... 159. 

CABLES 

♦Smartmodem to IBM Cable 17. 

.-Keyboard ExtensionCable(3to9/eed .... 27. 
--Extension Cables for IBM Mono Display ... 33. 
--Colorand Monochrome Extension cables. . 39. 

♦ --Printer-to-IBM cable 17. 

SURGE SUPPRESSORS 

♦ -Safeslrip 21. 

♦ ✓Diamond I'd oufte/sj 29. 

♦ ✓Emerald (6 ouftefs, 6 /¥ cord) 36. 

♦ ✓Sapphire (3 otrfte/s/E/W/rWF/fiffered; 47. 

*^Ruby(6outlets:EMI/RFIfilteted:6ftcord). . . 55. 

♦ ✓Command Center SPECIAL 79. 

DCA ... 1 year 

✓Smart Alec 639. 

✓Irma 769. 

Epson ... 1 year 

♦ ✓FX-85 printer (80 column) call 

♦ ✓FX-286 printer (736 cofomn^ call 

♦ ✓LX-SO printer co/umrd call 

♦ ✓LQ- 1000 printer (136column) call 

♦ ✓Printer-to-IBM cable 15. 


All educational programs listed are 
copy-protected. 

Barron's 

♦Computer SAT 35. 

Designware (reqs. graphics brd.) 

♦ Sj^ellicopter (ages 6 to adult) 22. 

Eduware (reqs. graphics brd.) 

♦ Algebra 1.2.3. or 4 22. 

Harcourt Brace Jovanovich 

✓Computer SAT 49. 

Stone (reqs. graphics brd.) 

✓My Letters.Numbers, Words (ages 1 to 5). . 29. 

✓Kids Stuff (ages 3 to 29. 

The Learning Company (reqs. graphics brd.) 

✓Reader Rabbit (ages 5 to 7; 26. 

✓Rocky’s Boots (ages 9 and upj 32. 

RECREATIONAL 

All recreational programs listed are 
copy-protected except where noted. 

Blue Chip 

✓Baron 32. 

✓Millionaire 32. 

Electronic Arts (reqs. graphics brd.) 

✓Pinball Construction Set 24. 

✓Music Construction Set 26. 

✓Dr J/Larry BirdOne-on-One 28. 

Hayden Software (reqs. graphics brd.) 
^SargonlW (highest rated Ches program) . . 32. 
Infocom (nor copy-protected) 

Difficulty levels shown in italics 
^JUNIOR 

Seastalker 25. 

^STANDARD 

♦ EfXJhanter ♦theWitr>ess ♦Plar>etfatl 

♦Cutthroat ♦Wishbringer ♦ZorkI 

♦ Ballyhoo FooWitzky 

♦ Hitchhiker’s Guide each 24. 

^ADVANCED 

ZorkI) Zorkin Sorcerer 

A Mind Forever Voyaging each 27. 

^EXPERT 

Spellbreaker Suspended . . . each 29. 
Invisiclues (hint booklets). Specify game ... 6. 
Microleague Sports (reqs. graphics brd.) 
-Microleague Baseball 25. 


Microprose (reqs. graphics brd.) 

*-F-15Srike Eagle 22. 

Microsoft (reqs. graphics brd.) 

(^✓FlightSimulator2.12 32. 

IStep Software (reqs. graphics brd.) 

It ✓Golf’s Best (P/nebursr; 32. 

fc ✓Golf’s Best (Sr. Andrew 'sj 32. 

Parlor Sof^are 

k M\dQe Patter (best Bridge simulation) .... 49. 
PCSoftware (not copy-protected) 

* ✓Championship Blackjack 25. 

Sierra On-Line (reqs. graphics brd.) 

► ✓King’s Quest II 33. 

Simon & Schuster (reqs. graphics brd.) 

► ✓StarTrek/Kobayashi 27. 

Spectrum Holobyte (reqs. graphics brd.) 

► ✓GATO 27. 

Sublogic (reqs. graphics brd.) 

► ✓Night Mission Pinball 29. 

► ✓Jet 33. 

► ✓Scenery (airport) disks for Jet each 1 5. 

► ✓Package of all 6 Western Airports 69. 

XOR (not copy-protected) 

✓NFL Challenge (be rbecoac/ij 79. 


1 - 800 / 243-8088 


PC Conrwctlon 

6 Mill Street 
Marlow. NH 03456 
603/446-3383 


270M 


For the IBM-PC (XT & AT) exclusively. 



•COPVWGHTMCBO CONNECTION, NC 1986 ALL ITEMS SUBJECT TO AVAILABIUTV PRICES SUBJECT TQ CHANGE WITHOUT NOTICE 



Hayes ... 2 years 

.^Smartmodem 300 $139. 

.^Smartmodem 1200 389. 

.^Smartmodem 12OOB(w/Sma/tcom/0 .... 349. 

.-•Smartmodem 1200B('noso/ifwarBj 309. 

v-Smartmodem 2400 special 

..'Smartmodem2400B|'w/Smartcom//^ .. special 

.-Smarlcom II 2.1 ('software^ 39. 

Hercules ... 2 years 

..^Hercules Color Card (jEjara/te/ port) 159. 

.-Hercules Graphics Card fpara/te/ port). . . , 299. 


$50 end user rebate direct from Hedies until 
August 31. 

Intel ... chips: 1 year; boards: 5 years 

Above Board PC 64k ('upgrades to 2 Meg). . call 
Above Board AT 1 28k (upgrades to 2 Meg) . call 
Above Board PS 64k C/^P (upgrades to 1.5 


Meg) call 

8087(forlBM-PC&XT) 129. 

8087-2 fworte on 8 Mhz computers; 177. 

^80287 (for 6 MHz IBM-PC AT) 225. 

^80287-8 (for 8 MHz IBM-PC AT) 269. 

Kensington Microware ... 1 year 

.-Masterpiece 94. 

.-Masterpiece Rus 129. 

.-Printer/portable computer stand 17. 

keytronic ... 90 days 

5150 keyboard 115. 

5151 keyboard Cde/uxe; 169. 

.-5153 keyboard (Vv/to touchpad; 279. 

Kraft ... 1 year 

--Joystick 29. 

^New! 3 Button Joystick 35. 

Mouse Systems ... 3 years 

-•PC Mouse with PC Paint + 139. 

--PC Mouse vrth Ready and PC Paint+ .... 149. 
NEC ... 90 days 

-■Multisync monitor (EGA compafrPte; 549. 

NSI Logic ... 2 years 

-EPIC fvrdeo adapter, EGA compaltofe;, . . . 279. 
Orchid Technologies ... 1 to 2 years 
Conquest Multifunction Board 0k upgrades 
to 2Mb, fully supports LOTUS/INTEL expanded 

memory specification (EMS) 264. 

-PC_NetBoard 319, 

- Eccell Multifunction Board for the AT 399. 

Tiny Turbo 286 459. 

PC Turbo 286ew/1 Meo 749. 

Turbo EGA call 

Paradise Systems ... 1 year 

-Cotor/Mono Card 149. 

Five Pack w/384k 159, 

-Auto Switch EGA call 

Princeton Graphics ... 1 year 
-MAX-12E Amber monochrome monitor . . 179. 

-HX-12 RGB monitor r690 x 240; 449, 

Quadram ... 1 to 2 years 


Expanded Quadboard with dock catendar, 


parallel, serial & game port, and 
Quadmaster software. 

0k ('upgrades to 384k; 129. 

384k('/lyflypopu/ated; 179. 

Microfazer Printer buffer (parallel) w/copy 
MP 64 (64k) upgrades to 51 2k 159. 


PC Connection 
Service Center 

Did you know that we are an authorized 
Epson and IOMEGA service center? We 
typically offer twenty-four hour turnaround 
on serviced items. Our labor charge is only 
$25 per hour. Call 1 -800-PCC-TECH 
extension 1 38 for a free telephone 
diagnosis. 


- QuadEGA-t- (half-card) $369. 

-Quadboard AT 128k 389. 


SMA ... 20Klay money-back guarantee 

PC-Documate Keyboard Templates 
avail^Pte for: 


DOS/Basic 2.0-2. 1 
-DOS/Basic3.0-3.1 
-Lotus 1-2-3 
-Symphony 
Framework 


-Multimate 
WordStar 
-WordStar 2000 
Turbo Pascal 
-WordPerfect 


each 12. 


Toshiba ... 90 days 

AH Toshiba printers feted are 24 pfr? dot matrix. 


• -P321 serial/parallel printer (80 00 /.; 519. 

*-P341 parallel printer Ct36<x>/umn; 849. 

• -P351 serial/parallel printer ('736 CO/,; .... 1089. 

Video? ... 2 years 

-VEGA (hatord; 369. 


DRIVES 


IOMEGA ... 90 days 

-Bernoulli Box 20 Meg W/PC2 card 1849. 

-10 Meg cartridge 51. 

-Bernoulli Box 40 Meg W/PC2 card 2449. 

-PC2B (Bootable) Card 219. 

-20 Meg cartridge 69. 

-Bernoulli Box Care Kit 79. 

Mountain Computer ... 1 year 

Drive Card 20 Meg call 

DriveCard30Meg call 

PC Connection ... 1 year 

20 Meg Hard Drive Card 489. 

Seagate ... 1 year 

20 Meg Internal Hard Drive (w/con^oOerand 

cabtes; 449. 

-20 Meg Internal Hard Drive for the AT ... . 569. 

TEAC ... lyear 

FD-55BVDriver5Vi'ha//-he/ghf,DS.DD;. . 109. 

Toshiba ... 90 days 

PC. XT 360k Drive (5V4'' half-height) 109. 

-AT 360k Drive (SVi^ha/f-heighf; 117. 


l-800r243-8088 

PC Connection 

6 Mill Street 

Marlow. NH 03456 270M 

603/446-3383 



MEMORY 

64k Memory Upgrade Set for IBM-PC or XT 


system board or any memory board 

150 nanosecond fset of® $15. 

200 nanosecond fset of 12. 

.. 12ak Memon/ Upgrade Set for IBM-AT 

System Board fOcfrrpspfggybacftecff 39. 

.. 256k Memory Urxrrade Set for any 
IBM AT memory board (9 chips) 39. 


DISKS 


All disks have a lifetime warranty. 

DS/DD Disks for the PC & XT (40 TPI). 

» ..Verbatim Datalife (10 disks per box) 17. 

*..MaxellMD-2ff0disteperbox^ 19 

DS/High Density Disks for the AT (96 TPI). 

.•Fuf(IOdisksperbox) 27. 

Maxell (10 disks per box) 34. 

Merbafim (10 disks per box) 34. 

...Flip Sort (hofab 75 cfeksj 15. 

..'FlopplcleneDiskDriveCleaner(5Vii'7 .... 18. 

. .-Innovstlve Concepts Rip n' File 50 16. 

. .-Innovstlve Concepts Rip n' RIe 50 w/lock 21 . 


INFORMATION SERVICES 

CompuServe 

* .Ctmpuserve Information Service 

(Snc/udes subscription, manual. 5 hours of connect 
time, monthly publications) 24. 

OUR POLICY 

a We accept VISA and MASTERCARD. 

(Only on U S. & Canadian orders.) 

• No surcharge added for charge orders. 

• Your card is not charged until we ship. 

• tf we must ship a partial order, we never charge freight 
on the shipment(s) thstt complete the order. 

• Nosalestax. 

• All shipments insured: no addrtkxtal charge. 

• AJIowl week for personal and company checks to 
dear. 

• UPS Next-Day-Air available. 

• CODmax. $1000. Cash or certified check. 

• 1 20 day limited warranty on all products. * 

• To order, call us anytime Monday thru Friday 9;00 to 
9:00. or Saturday 9:X to 5:30. You can call our 
business offices at 603/446-3383 MoTKlay through 
Friday 9:00 to 5:X. 

SHIPPING 

Note: Accounts on net terms pay actual shipping. 
Contirwntal US: For monitors, printers. ar>d drives, 
add 2% for UPS ground shipping. Ca> for UPS Blue or 
UPS Next-Day-Air. For all other items, add $2 per order 
to cover UPS shipping. We will automdically use UPS 
2nd-Day-Ajr at rto extra charge if you are more than 2 
days from us by UPS ground. Hawaii: For monitors, 
printers, and drives, actual UPS Blue charge wi be 
added. For all other items, add $2 per order. Alaska 
and outside Continental US: Cat 603/446-3383 for 
information. 


CIRCLE 339 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


For the IBM-PC (XT & AT) exclusively. 



' OCFECTIVE SOFTWARE REPLACED IMMEDIATELY DEFECTIVE HARDWARE REPLACED OR REPAIRED AT OUR DISCRETION SOME ITEMS HAVE MANUFACTURERS WARRANTIES UP TO FIVE YEARS 



PC Precision. 


The Big Bleep. 

ome people still think mail order is a slapdash 
operation where quantity is king and quality the 
banished prince. Obviously they’ve never seen our 
product interrogation room (a.k.a. tech department) here 
in Marlow, NH (pop. 552). Every day, programs and peri- 
pherals swagger in, acting like they're the greatest thing 
since bottled water. After hours of grueling experiments, 
many emerge victorious. The rest stagger out humili- 
ated, defeat^, begging us not to reveal their tragic 
flaws. 

The Long Good Buy. 

These days any company can get 
an 800 number, set up a ware 
house, fill it with boxes and labels, 
park a tractor trailer at one end, 
and call itself a mail order hou,se. 

But it takes a mad lust tor truth 
to really serve micro users. Who 
knows what evil lurks in the hearts 
of circuit boards and software? 

We do. 


We give all our products the third degree, so we can 
give all our customers the straight scoop. Like whether 
that word processor will support your printer. Or if those 
two memory-resident prt^rams can peacefully co-exist. 

Or if that graphics card can keep up with your new 
monitor. 

It's a jungle out there, folks. But we've gathered the 
evidence and the verdicts are in. 

Choose your weapon. 

A customer from California writes: "Your technical sup- 
port is great! But how do 1 open my 
computer? " With the PC Connection 
8-piece Tool Kit, of course. The 
solution to any installation intrigue. 
A $29.95 value— we’ll send one 
free to everyone who places a $750 
order between now and Sept. 30. 

Just call 1-800/243-8088 or 
1-603/446-3383, M-F 9:00 to 9:00; 
Saturday to 5:30. If you’re planning 
to visit, call ahead to make sure 
what you want is in stock. 




.Mastrr your micro tvith a free PC Connection 
Tool Kit. Screwdrivers, nutdrivers, chip puller, 
inserter, and more. Offer not available to com- 
mercial accounts. Limit one per customer. 


For the IBM-PC (XT & AT) exclusively. 



. OOevnCMT MKSO CONMECTON MC W UlCaOCONNCCtDM MO THE MCOON CHMACTtaSl Mf tMMCUAMS Of UlCSO COMCCTOM MC K CONNCCTION « AIWOSTENEO TMOCUSM 0* WCMO CONMSCTKM MC kUMOW NM 



BUILD-YOUR-OWN AT 



THE CHIPSet DIFFERENCE 

A little company called Chips and Technologies leads the 

way in packing more AT performance into less space for a lower price. 

I BM lakes a traditional approach to I tion. Chips and Technologies, inciden- I market. By replai 
building a PC AT motherbo^. It uses tally, won a PC Magazine Technical Ex- you can upgrade 


Xbuilding a PC AT motherboard. It uses 
a handful of high-tech chips — the 286 
central processing unit, the memory, and 
the direct-memory access controller — 
plus a handful of low-tech “glue” chips. 
The glue chips perform a vital function, 
but their density is much lower than that 
of the high-tech chips. 

Chips and Technologies of Milpitas, 
California, has developed an alternative 
approach. Its five-chip PC AT-compati- 
ble CHIPSet replaces most of the glue 
chips in an AT or compatible machine. 
The CHIPSet design allows the mother- 
board to be smaller and also reduces 
board design time and power consump- 


tion. Chips and Technologies, inciden- 
tally. won a PC Magazine Technical Ex- 
cellence Award last April for its EGA 
(enhanced graphics adapter) chip set, 
which has made possible the current 
spate of half-slot ^A boards. For more 
on these boards, see this issue’s cover 
story. 

Red River Technology, one of the 
first companies to incorporate the CHIP- 
Set into its product, offers an AT mother- 
board small enough to fit into a PC or XT 
chassis whose power consumption is low 
enough to ran on an XT-style 135-watt 
power supply. Besides the market for 
new AT systems, the firm is targeting its 
AT motherboard at the existing PC-XT 


market. By replacing your motherboard, 
you can upgrade an existing PC or XT 
and still retain your chassis, power sup- 
ply, keyboard, and peripherals. 

The CHIPSet difference is evident 
when you compare the motherboard 
from Red River Technology with the 
ACS motherboard used in the PC De- 
signs ET286i machine. The ACS moth- 
erboard is the standard AT size, about 12 
by 13 inches. It holds about 100 chips, 
not including the 36 memory chips. The 
Red River Technology board is just 8 by 
1 1 inches and contains about 65 chips 
plus 18 memory chips — two-thirds the 
size of a standard design with about two- 
thirds as many chips. — Robin Raskin 


WHERE TO FIND AT COMPONENTS 


'l^uilding a customized AT-compati- 
Dble machine from scratch requires 

glance through the back pages of com- 

has pertinent information or experience. 

puter magazines to find companies ad- 

you'll need to devote some time to call- 

some sophisticated price-comparison 

vertising AT components. The best way 

ing a number of the mail-order houses. 

shopping. We’ve put together a list of a 

to choose a mail-order product is, of 

Be sure to ask about delivery schedules, 

few of the mail-order companies hawk- 

course, by personal recommendation. If, 

warranties, guarantees, and, when appli- 

ing generic AT parts. You can also 

however, you don’t know anyone who 

cable, compatibility. 

Ace Technology 

Computer Dynamics Inc. 

PC's Limited 

230 N. Crescent Way. #0 

2201 Donley, #304 

161 1 Headway Circle, Bldg. 3 

Anaheim, CA 02801 

Austin, TX 78758 

Austin. TX 78754 

(800)558-8842 (71 4) 758-8158 

(512)836-5707 

(512)339-6964 

Keyboards and power supplies. 

CIRCLE 6t2 ON READER SERVICE CARO 

ATronics International Inc. 

Add-in cards and other accessories. 

CIRCLE 686 ON READER SERVICE CARD 

(800) 426-5 150 (outside Texas) 

(800) 252-8336 

ELTECH Research 

Floppy and hard drives, display cards, multifunc- 
tion cards, controllers, and I/O cards. 

491 Valley Way 

318 S. Abel St. 

CIRCLE 665 ON READER SERVKX CARD 

MUpitas.CA 95035 

Milpitas, CA 95035 

(408)943-6629 

(408) 942- 1 260, (408) 9464)325 

Smaitek Inc 

System boards, chassis, keyboards, and pow^ 

Hard and floppy drives, controllers, power sup- 

2000WyattDr..#3 

$i^)|^es. 

plies. and display, multifunction, and I/O cards. 

Santa Qara, CA 95054 

ciRaE aai on reader service card 

Cl RCL E 658 ON READER SERVICE C>^ 

(408)988-4112 

AT motherboards and a fill) line of AT accessories. 

CompuMail 

1 1815 Forestgate Dr. 

Figure Inc. 

23482 Peralta Dr. 

CIRCLE 664 ON READER SERVICE CARO 

Dallas. TX 75243 

Uguna Hills. CA 92653 

Soletek Computer Supply 

(800) 225-0227. then dial 995272 (outside Texas) 

(714) 859-0522 

1 122-C2 W. Washington Blvd. 

(800) 222-1537 (cxl. 995272) 

Multifunction cards aiKl I/O cards. 

Montebello. CA 90640 

Hard and floppy disks, controllers, display cards. 

CIRCLE 657 ON f^ADER SERVICE CARD 

(213)721-6024 

multifunction cards, and other accessories. 

Mission Peak Systems 

C!hassis and power supplies. 

QRCLE 680 ON READER SERVICE CARO 

3514ArdenRd. ' 

Hayward. CA 94545 ' 

(415)887-0756 

Keyboard.s. 

CIRCLE 653 ON READER SERVICE CARO 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
206 





BOOSTING COMPUTER CLOCK SPEEDS 

You’ve heard a lot of conflicting stories about 8- and 10-MHz clock 
speeds — do they work with everything or not? 

Contributing editor Winn L. Rosch gives you the scoop. 


A ll personal computeis have clock 
generators. The pritnaiy purpose of 
these computer clocks is not to ke^ track 
of the time of day but to synchronize the 
operation of all the circuits inside the 
computer. The clock signal is a tegular 
series of pulses; each clock pulse tells the 
computer circuits to make another deci- 
sion. The faster the pulse rate, the faster 
the computer can process. 

Although different sections of the 
computer may operate at different 
speeds, all operations ate synchronized 
to the system clock. In the AT, the clock 
rate is determined by a quartz crystal; the 
clock speed is exa^y one-half the fre- 
quency set by the crystal. 

Computer clocks catuiot operate at 
any arbitrary speed. The clock rate must 
be within a narrow window: it must be 
fast enough to refresh the kind of memo- 
ry chips most prevalent in PCs, which 
can remember data only for a fraction of 
a second. Also, the clock rate must be 
slower dian the fastest speed at which 
semiconductor circuits in the computer 
can operate. 

THE SPEED mVOT The maximum 
operating speed of these solid-state logic 
circuits is determined during manufac- 
ture arxl depends on complex design con- 
siderations. In general, faster circuits 
must be either smaller or use greater elec- 
trical current or both. Either way, faster 
circuits are more difficult to design and 
manufacture. 


Not all of the components in a person- 
al computer operate at the same speed; 
the microprocessor is usually the fastest. 
To keep it from outrunning the more lag- 
gardly components, such as chips on ex- 
pansion boards, the microprocessor is 
made to pause briefly. These pauses are 
called “wait states.” 

Another clock-speed limit is the cir- 
cuitry of the computer itself. The higher 
the clock speed, the more critical the lay- 
out of the parts on the circuit board be- 
comes. Faster circuit boards are also 
more difficult to design and make. 

Errors result when the speed limit of 
either the semiconductor chips or the cir- 
cuit board is exceeded. When this hap- 
pens, the computer cannot cany out one 
step of its thinking operation before the 
clock demands it to inake another. Con- 
sequently, faster computers require faster 
chips and better over^l designs, and ar- 
bitrarily increasing the speed of the sys- 
tem clock alone may not be success^. 
The original IBM PC AT was probably 
designed to operate at 8 MHz (a clock 
rate of 8 million pulses per second), and 
so it readily accepted a boost to 8 from its 
initial 6-N^ setup. 

Other computers, like the PC Designs 
ET286i, are deigned to operate at higher 
speeds and, sometimes, without wait 
states. However, these machines must 
abide by the limits set by their semicon- 
ductor circuits. Not just the microproces- 
sor, but all chips in the computer, must 
operate at the higher clock sp^, includ- 


ing the chips on expansion boards. 

The majority of expansion boards cur- 
rently available for the AT operate well at 
8 MHz. At speeds higher than about 9 
MHz, most expansion boards become er- 
ratic. 

COMPATIBILITy PROBLEMS Al- 
though high speeds might also cause soft- 
ware compatibility problems, most such 
difficulties arise fiom early copy-protec- 
tion schemes. Since copy protection is 
generally being abandoned and most 
software is now clock speed- 
independent, software-compatibility is- 
sues are decreasing in importance. (The 
only remaining problem programs are 
games, some of which become impossi- 
bly fast on high-performance personal 
computers.) 

Ihe practical limit to computer oper- 
ating speeds, therefore, is the ability of 
expansion products to handle high clock 
rates. With the increasing number of per- 
sonal computers designed for operation 
above 8 MHz, peripheral vendors are 
boosting the speed ratings of their prod- 
ucts, too. Switch-selectable speeds in a 
computer are a genuine blessing; the 
clock can be set to be compatible with to- 
day’s peripherals, and, when better ex- 
pansion products become available, per- 
formance can be easily improved. 

— Winn L. Rosch 

Winn L. Rosch is a contributing editor of 
PC Magazine. 


errors while running at 10 MHz. These 
were the only times the machine crashed, 
so it seems appropriate to blame the dis- 
play card, not the motherboard. Not all pe- 
ripheral cards will work at 10 MHz, and 
cards that do may be accidents waiting to 
happen. The ATI Monographics card did 
appear to work reliably at 10 MHz in the 
FC Designs machine, and it worked reli- 
ably at 8 and 6 MHz in the Red River. 


The IBM EGA card didn’t work in the 
Red River ATlas at 10 MHz, even though 
it did work at 10 MHz in a souped-up IBM 
PC AT. Conversely, the Intel AboveBoard 
AT did work at 10 MHz in the Red River 
machine, although it didn’t work in an 
IBM PC AT boosted to 10 MHz. 

Before purchasing any AT-altemative 
kit or build-your-own parts , make sure that 
every peripheral you want to use will work 


in that particular machine. The standard 
peripherals (display adapters, memory, 
multifunction boards) are a safe bet. But 
you should be inquisitive about network- 
ing cards, advanced graphics cards, and 
data acquisition systems. 

SOFTWARE COMPAUBOITY Since 
not all hardware is created equal, not all 
software packages will run flawlessly on 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
207 




■ BUILD-YOUR-OWNAT 


all machines. I tested several business 
packages, including dSy45£// andlll, 1-2- 
3, Microsoft Word, and SideKick, plus 
some packages that ate notorious for giv- 
ing the hardware a rough time: CopyWrite 
and Jet. The only problems I met were 
with copy-protected floppy disks. 

On both machines, 1-2-3 and dBASE 
refused to start up at 10 MHz, claiming 
that the key disk was an unauthorized du- 
plicate. In fact, both were the original dis- 
tribution diskettes. 

Both packages worked at 6 MHz. Re- 
sults like these give the PC Designs ma- 
chine an advantage, because you can start 
a timing-sensitive protected package at 
low speed and then switch into high speed 


■ Despite the obstacles, 
building an AT kit is 
a worthwhile enterprise. 


to operate the package. 

In a similar vein, both machines had 
problems running the CopyWrite disk-du- 
plication program. The symptoms varied 
according to speed, but at all speeds Co- 
pyWrite was unable to duplicate a disk. 
Disk-copier programs, like copy-protected 
programs, rely on marginal, undocument- 
ed quirks in the IBM PC AT floppy-disk 
interface. 

Pinball Construction Set is a riot at 10 
MHz, The ball moves too fast to play, but 
it's fun to watch the demo. If you crave fast 
action, you’ll love its Methedrine pace. Jet 
works nicely at 10 MHz. 

Microsoft Word ran perfectly on the 
Red River system, but on the ET286i it 
was plagued by incorrect graphics charac- 
ters. PC Designs is working on a solution. 

FINISHING TOUCHES Despite the ob- 
stacles, kit building is a worthwhile enter- 
prise. Anyone can conquer many of the 
available AT kits, and the resulting ma- 
chines ate good performers (see bench- 
mark charts). The PC Magazine Labs 
benchmark-test results showed the PC De- 
signs and the Red River machines mnning 
neck and neck at both 6 MHz and 1 0 MHz. 



BENCHMARK 


TESTS 


Red River ATIas-based ati«(6mhz) □Hamdisii □soiiaydisii 

System vs. IBM PC AT ATIaXIOWmi OHanldisk MnoppyHlsk 

BM re AT (t MHz) ■Hard disk ■Ropfiydlsk 



The Disk Input/Output benchmafk lest measures the time it takes to create a 200K-byle data fie u3ing recxfd lenolhs Of 
512 bytes and 578 b^. The test pro^am then perkxms a random read ol 2S6 recorcs from the cretM data Me, Mowed 
by a sequential read o< the same recow. 



The Prime Number Calcu> 
Mlon benchmark test mea- 
sures tie speed at which the 
computer can find all tie 
prime numbers between 1 
and SO. 

The Compiler Routine 
benchmark test assesses 
tie o p oo dot program dwel- 
opm^ In tie microproces- 
sor and RAM by way of a 
t«o-step. seN-iiming DOS 
batch file using tie IBM 
Personal Conifxjter Linker 
program. Stage 1 takes a 
34l4ne a ss e mb ly code file 


(ASM), converts N to binary 
code, and hnk-edits it witti 
otier binary ties to make 
an executable (.EXE) file. 
Stage 2 compiles and links 
source code to resohe ad- 
dress references and make 
an executable file. 

The dBASE Routine 
benchmark test for data- 
base applications assesses 
how quiddy tie machine 
reads and writes to disk by 
performing a series of disK- 
intenaive dBASE II. Version 
2.41 tasks. The set-timing 


DOS batch fite runs a total 
of six dBASE routines on 81 
indivkkJai database records 
consisting of 154 bytes each: 
sortiru on a database file 
{.DBH. indaung on 2 of tie 
13 data fields in each rec- 
ord, copying to a temporary 
database file, setting two 
indeNss on a database file, 
appending a record, and 
deieitng a record and pack- 
ing (or removinQ the ditta 
hole from) tie ntabase fite. 

The 1-2-3 Routint bench- 


mark test for axeadsheel 
applica t ions, designed for a 
640K -byte envifonmert, as- 
sesses tie computational 
speedandRAMmanage- 
mentcapabiittesoftiema- 
chlne by using a f -2-3 macro 
tiat penorms a series of 
boti global and individuai 
workaieet tasks. The macro 
copies and recalculates a 
10^ range 499 times, 
moms i.OoOoet8.delolOB 
lOOO cells, and ttien sys- 
tematcaty dears tie 
spreadsheeL 


In comparing the Red River ATIas-based machine to a standard AT, one finds the greatest 
difference is in disk HO routines. At the same clock speed (6 Mhz), the ATlas performs faster; and. 
at 10 Mhz, disk 110 improves only slightly, but the applications tasks run roughly 40 percent faster. 


At 6 MHz, these machines are as fa.st as an 
IBM PC AT; at 10 MHz both machines are 
about 70 percent faster. Both were con- 
nected to Seagate hard disks, so it's not 
surprising that they showed similar muscle 
in disk-intensive benchmark testing. 

Packaged kits like the ET286i are the 
perfect solution for the user who wants to 
save money, configure a marvelous sys- 
tem, and do some cursory exploration of 
the AT. The ATlas board is a natural for 


anyone wishing to upgrade an XT, and the 
Red River "build from a board" option is 
ideal for maximum customization. 

Kits are attractive AT alternatives for 
patient and price-conscious users who 
have a clear idea of their needs and won't 
mind tightening a few screws in order to 
get a personalized machine. Kj 


Robin Raskin is a frequent contributor to 
PC Magazine. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1985 
208 






ACS-1000 

• 8 Or 4.77 MHz 

• Up to 1 Meg Memory 

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• 1 Parallel Port 

• On Board Disk 
Controller 

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ET-286 p/os 

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■ 2 Parallel Ports 

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• On-Board Clock/ 
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• ACS MS-DOS 3.2 

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A HERITAGE OF EXCELLENCE In any marketplace one product stands out as the 
pinnacle of performance and value. In the PC/XT marketplace, that product is the 
ACS-1000: 4.77 or 8 MHz operation, 1 Megabyte memory, built in communications, 
built in floppy disk controllers, even a SASI interface — all packaged on a single board 
and priced competitively with the merely compatible. 

Building on the heritage of the ACS-1000, the ET-286 plus brings the same stan- 
dards of excellence to the AT marketplace. 


Push Back 
The Envelope: 

10/6 

8t 12.5 MHz 

AT Compatibility 

IBM obviously positioned 
the AT as the hub of the 
microcomputer network. 

ACS has included what IBM 
left out. 

SPEED The ET-286 nearly 
doubles the clock speed of 
the AT at 10 MHz and we are 
already 12.5 MHz capable. 
With access to 4 Megabytes 
of on-board memory via a 
5MHz DMA bus, the ET-286 
bypasses additional wait 
states required to maintain 
compatibility with expansion 
bus memory. With memory 
intensive network software 
like Unix and Xenix, this 
becomes critical. Naturally, 
the ET-286 toggles from Hy- 
perSpeed at 10MHz to 100% 
6MHz compatibility for those 
applications that demand it. 

COMMUNICATIONS The 

ET-286 plus is designed with 
communications in mind. 
There are three on-board 
serial ports that are configu- 
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RS-232 depending on your 
application. 2 parallel ports 
further extend your commu- 
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additional I/O. 

AN ACCESSIBLE SOURCE 

Part of the success of the 
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Even with all these fea- 
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■ SOFTWARE ■ MARVIN BRYAN 


BUSINESS 

FORECASTING 

16 Ways to Predict the Future 

Forecasting and statistics packages are no longer 
limited to those ported from mainframes. Now 
you can find power and a wide range of functions 
combined with easy menu interfaces and helpful tutorials. 

Richard Wiser 
goes to work, he 
▼ ▼ doesn’t carry a crystal 

ball with him. But he peeks into the future 
with some assurance thanks to ESP. a sta- 
tistical analysis package. As director of 
business and marketing analysis at Mary 
Kay Cosmetics in Dallas, Wiser uses ESP 
to fill a variety of forecasting needs. When 
the company plans a sales promotion, he 
tries to predict how much additional prod- 
uct the promotional effort will inspire deal- 
ers to order. He regularly forecasts the size 
and frequency of orders, and he down- 
loads economic information that helps him 
forecast recruiting figures. 

John Fahey, chief economist for the 
Saudi Arabian embassy in London, uses 
another statistical program, SORITEC. to 
track the comnMdities market, trends in in- 
ternational trade, financial analysis, na- 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
211 


Illustration: Greg Couch 


■ BUSINESS FORECASTING 


tional welfare projections, and oil price 
predictions. Jeffrey Martin, a Palo Alto, 
California, CPA who specializes in litiga- 
tion support for attorneys, enters historical 
sales and earnings of specified companies 
into the Lotus spreadsheet template 1 ,2,3 
Forecast! and plots a trend line. Radical 
deviations from this trend line can alert 
him to the existence of unknown factors 
that are affecting the company’s perfor- 
mance. And at a Selma, Alabtuna, farm- 
implement manufacturing company with 
the picturesque name of Bush Hog, Ernest 
Divelbiss uses Forecast Plus to combine 
company statistics with data from outside 
sources to predict farm income and other 
economic trends. From these figures in 
turn, he forecasts sales of each Bush Hog 
product. 

These businesspeople and many others 
use forecasting programs to collect and an- 
alyze information to make reliable predic- 
tions about the future. Based on their find- 
ings, they’ll recommend strategies to their 
companies. 

TTie earliest forecasting programs avail- 
able for the PC, based on mainframe ver- 
sions, were difficult for anyone but FOR- 
TRAN programmers to use. Now, 
however, a rich assortment exists, ranging 
from simple, menu-driven packages for 
people with little or no statistical training 
to comprehensive programs suitable for 
professional economists and statisticians. 
Even some of the most powerful programs 
are surprisingly easy to use. 

The plentiful supply of forecasting soft- 
ware is a mixed blessing: with so many 
packages to choose among, your chances 
of happening on the right one are small — 
and few people have the time to test each 
product. We’ve done that work for you, 
winnowing the field down to the 16 excel- 
lent packages reviewed below. 

^h of the 16 packages is a valuable 
forecasting tool in its own category, and all 
are accurate in their calculations. They 
range in price from a slick template for 
7-2 -J that sells for $89.95 to the PC ver- 
sion of a mainframe package that will set 
you back $1 ,500 if you buy all the avail- 
able modules. Some are strictly for fore- 
casting, but others reviewed will perform 
many other kinds of statistical chores as 
well. Most import Lohis’s 1-2-3 or main- 
frame data files. 


PREPARING A FORECAST Although 
forecasts focus on the future, they cannot 
be prepared in a vacuum. They must be 
bas^, to a large extent, on what has hap- 
pened in the past: both the actual figures 
for past periods and a knowledge of the 
factors, such as poor product distribution 
or a sag in the economy, that influenced 
those figures. 

Once you have gathered the appropriate 
history, you can graph the data. A graph is 
the easiest way to spot any underlying pat- 
terns such as seasonality or a sudden drop 
in sales that might have been caused by a 
strike at the manufacturing plant. Special 
statistical techniques are designed to deal 
with irregularities of these types; you 


UU E D 1 T O R ’ S 
■a C H O I C E 


Each of the forecasting packages 
surveyed here is excellent in its cate- 
gory, For business forecasting use, 
however, the most impressive ones 
are those that limit their scope to 
forecasting and are either unusually 
easy to use or exceptional bargains. 
If you already have 1-2-3 or 
Symphony, you can hardly go 
wrong by paying an extra $89,95 
for the 1,2,3 Forecast! template. 
Even easier to use is SmartF ore- 
casts II, though it is much more ex- 
pensive. The third choice is Fore- 
castMaster, which gets the nod as a 
highly advanced program that can 
also be operated from menus. 


would select an analysis model and make a 
trial run. 

Regression, the statistical procedure 
customarily used for forecasting, is used to 
determine if relationships exist between 
two sets of numbers — to what extent, for 
example, car sales depend on employ- 
ment. The particular type of regression 
analysis employed in forecasting is the 
time series, which assumes that the data 
used was gathered at evenly spaced inter- 
vals in time. Box-Jenkins or ARIMA mod- 
eling (for AutoRegressive Integrated Mov- 
ing Average) is an advanced form of time 
series analysis used in more-sophisticated 


statistics packages; its inclusion or absence 
in a forecasting program is sometimes used 
as a yardstick to size up a program’s pow- 
er. (For definitions of unfamiliar terms, 
see glossary on the following page.) 

Some PC-based statistical software also 
includes spectral analysis (also called Fou- 
rier analysis in honor of a French math- 
ematician of the early 19th century). This 
method, originally applied to the physical 
sciences, decomposes the data into a sum 
of trigonometric components, creating a 
waveform that is most appropriate for ana- 
lyzing data with a pattern of repeating cy- 
cles. 

How do you evaluate time-series out- 
put? Three clues will help you determine 
the appropriateness of the model. First, 
look at the residuals, the difference ob- 
tained when you subtract the forecast or 
“fitted” values from the actual values. Re- 
siduals are often shown on a graph as a se- 
ries of dots. If the dots have a completely 
random distribution, you may have picked 
a good forecasting model for your data. 
Otherwise, the data is being influenced by 
factors you haven’t considered and that are 
missing from your equation. 

A second clue is a glance at the r- 
squared value, called the “coefficient of 
determination . ’ ’ This value will be labeled 
on your printout so that it can be identified 
even by a beginner. It represents the per- 
centage of the variation in the data that can 
he explained by the model. A value here of 
.468, for example, would indicate that 
over half of the fluctuations in the data 
were probably caused by factors not yet in 
your equation. A value of .986 would indi- 
cate that nearly 100 percent of the pattern 
can be explained by the equation and that 
you may be able to use the projected future 
values with some confidence. 

But you must also check the size of the 
errors in the forecast. These are usually 
shown on the printout as SE, for “standard 
error,” and MSE, the “mean squared er- 
ror.” These figures should be as small as 
possible. 

Smoothing Using these indications, 
you continue adjusting and trying models 
until you have the best possible fit. You 
can “transform,” or mathematically ad- 
just, the data to account for seasonal differ- 
ences, for example. One transformation. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
212 


the “moving averages” technique, can re- 
place a figure for one time period with the 
average of that period plus the periods im- 
mediately preceding and following; this 
technique “smooths” the data to account 
for such irregularities in sales, for in- 
stance, as those caused by occasional sales 
contests or by television advertising that 
appears only every third month. 

When you have the most appropriate 
model, you must still use your best judg- 
ment and your knowledge of current con- 
ditions to temper the projected figures you 
will pass on to others. A mistake could be 
very damaging; for example, your compa- 
ny could overproduce a product to meet an 
imaginary demand or sell a division in the 


mistaken belief that it would not remain 
profitable. 

Some of the packages reviewed here 
will perform all of the statistical steps auto- 
matically, creating the necessary formulas 
and even trying the data with several mod- 
els, selecting the “winner” and displaying 
the forecast without requiring any interac- 
tion at all from you . Most of them will also 
permit advanced users to enter custom for- 
mulas. 

HOW TO EVALUATE THE SOFT- 
WARE Before you choose a statistical 
package, consider the hardware require- 
ments. Some programs make heavy de- 
mands, such as a full 640K bytes of RAM, 


an 8087 chip, or a hard disk. One demands 
hard disk storage for 50 program disks to 
run the entire package. Some are limited to 
handling smaller data sets than others be- 
cuse they hold all of the data in RAM si- 
multaneously for maximum speed of cal- 
culation. 

Pay attention to the level of expertise 
required of you. Although many of the 
programs come with excellent manuals 
and interactive, on-line tutorials, some as- 
sume a certain level of knowledge. Most 
econometric packages expect you to have 
experience in preparing forecasts based in 
part on economic trends and data, as well 
as a general knowledge of statistical proce- 
dures. 


A FEW DEFINITIONS FOR NONSTATISTICIANS 


Box-Jenkins One of a class of models 
called ARIMA, for AutoRegressive Inte- 
grated Moving Average. Identifies possi- 
ble useful models and checks each in turn 
against the time series until it finds the 
one that fits. 

Case See Observation. 

Confidence interval A group of values 
used to estimate a statistical parameter. 
The confidence interval tends to include 
the true value of the parameter a predeter- 
mined proportion of the time (for in- 
stance, 90 percent) if the process of find- 
ing the group of values is repeated a 
number of times. 

Data points Ihe number of values a sta- 
tistical software package can process in a 
procedure at one time. Often, the allowa- 
ble number of data points is equal to the 
number of variables allowed multiplied 
by the number of observations allowed. 
Deseasonalization A method for remov- 
ing any seasonal fluctuations that may 
distort the meaning of the data. 
DifTerendtig A method of taking out 
seasonality by subtracting the second 
data point from the first, the third from 
the second, and so on. 

Durbin-Watson figure A model that de- 
termines if the variables in the equation 
are serially correlated, a condition that 
casts doubt on the reliability of the fore- 
cast. 


Econometrics The application of statis- 
tical methods to the study of economic 
data. 

Eigenvalue A scalar associated with a 
given linear transformation of a vector 
space. 

Exponential smoothirrg A method of 
transforming time series data for a better 
fit by creating a weighted average. 
Fourier analysis See Spectral analysis. 
Iterative Refers to mathematical proce- 
dures that find an optimum figure by per- 
forming repeated calculations dealing 
with the same data. 

Lag In regression calculations, observa- 
tions for one of the variables may be 
“lagged” or shifted by one or more time 
periods to achieve a more realistic com- 
parison between the variables. For in- 
stance, an advertising expenditure this 
month may affect sales for next month. 
Least squares A basic method of fitting 
a regression line mathematically so that 
the sum of the squared errors is smaller 
than any other straight-line model. 
Moving average A method for using the 
average of past forecasting errors to cal- 
culate new forecasts. 

Observation An individual value re- 
corded for a variable. In a list showing 
monthly telephone expenses for a year, 
the amount of the bill for any one month 
would constitute an observation. 


Regression An analysis that expresses a 
dependent variable as the result of a for- 
mula approximation involving one or 
more independent variables. 

Residuals The difference obtained when 
you subtract the forecast or “fitted” val- 
ues from the actual values. 

Spectral analysis Decomposing the data 
into a sum of trigonometric components 
to create a waveform that is most appro- 
priate for analyzing data with a pattern of 
repeating cycl^. 

State space A forecasting technique that 
exploits the relationship of time series 
techniques to an advanced procedure 
called canonical correlation arialysis. 
Time series The type of regression anal- 
ysis employed forecasting. It assumes 
that the data us^ was gathered at evenly 
spaced intervals in time. Box-Jenkins is 
an advanced form of time series analysis. 
Transformation A mathematical adjust- 
ment made to a set of figures to improve 
thofit of the regression line. 

Value Each of the weekly numbers for 
the variable “sales tax” us^ as an exam- 
ple in the following definition would be 
called a value. See also Variable. 
Variable A number whose value may 
change. In practice, the group of num- 
bers belonging to a particular item in a 
data set — ^for example, a collection of 
weekly figures for “sales tax.” 


PC MAGAZINE a AUGUST 1986 
213 



■ BUSINESS FORECASTING 


Programs that incorporate a program- 
ming language may be able to cituich ad- 
vanced statistical models beyond those 
specified in the manual. To take advantage 
of these capabilities, you must be able to 
write complicated algorithms to add to the 
command structure. On the other hand, 
some of the menu-driven packages require 
no math knowledge at all. 

Whatever business you’re in, it’s likely 
that a forecasting package will be able to 
help you. To let you try before you buy, 
most statistical software publishers sell in- 
expensive demonstration versions or sup- 
ply evaluation copies to legitimate pros- 
pects. After you buy a package, you’re not 
alone: most publishers offer technical sup- 
port that is prompt, skilled, and free. 


1,2,3 FORECAST! 

Bruce Gates, the statistics professor who 
wrote 1,2,3 Forecast!, is one of the rate 
university gurus with a true business orien- 
tation, In 1,2,3 Forecast! he has created a 
template that enables people who’ve never 
seen a statistics textbook to prxxluce usable 
forecasts. All you have to do is follow the 
lucid tutorials in the manual and read the 
choices on the menus. 

Don’t let the program’s simplicity fool 
you, however. 1,2,3 Forecast! is no toy. 
Large businesses prefer it to packages 
costing thousands of dollars. 

Thartks to Gates’s accurate formulas 
and the power of Lotus’s software (ver- 
sions are available for all releases of 1-2-3 


FACT FILE 


l^^Foncast! 

Bruce L. Gates 
P.O. Box 12582 
Salem. OR 97309 
(503)585-8314 
List Price: $89.95 
Requires: 5I2K 
RAM , two disk drives, 
DOS 2.0 or later, 1-2-3 or Symphony. 

In Short: An inexpensive menu-driven 
Lotus template that lets users on any level , 
with or without statistical experience, cre- 
ate forecasts. Not copy protected. 

CIRCl£ 686 ON READER SERVICE CARO 

MkroOat 
Ecosoftlnc. 

6413 N. College Ave. 
Indianapc^, IN 46220 
(317)255^76 
Urt Price: $375 
Requires: 128K 
RAM, one disk drive, 

DOS l.Oorltfer. 

In SkmI: a basic menu-driven, general 
statistical packi^ that handles forecasting 
smoothly but lacks many sofrfiisticated pro- 
cedures. The program is easy to use and 
highly accurate but requires a knowledge 
of statistics. Not copy protected. 

OnCLE aaa ON REAOQt SERVICE CARO 



and for Symphony), you can see your re- 
sults almost instantly on 1,2,3 Forecast!' s 
prepared worksheets or in graphs. The pro- 
gram's major limitation is its scope: it can 
handle only ten independent variables and 
a maximum of 150 observations. 

1,2,3 Forecast! adjusts for seasons up 


1,2,3 Forecast!, on 
inexpensive but 
effective Lotus template, 
projects trend lines like 
this one almost 
instantly, using 1-2-3 
or Symphony data. 



to 30 periods in length and automatically 
evaluates the significance of its calcula- 
tions. It includes complete arithmetic 
transformations as well as lags and differ- 
encing (a method of taking out seasonality 
by subtracting the second data point from 
the first, the third from the second, and so 
on). It will calculate a Durbin-Watson fig- 
ure, which helps determine if the variables 
in the equation are serially conelated — 
that is, if this month’s figures depend on 
last month’s figures. If they do, the fore- 
cast may be unreliable. 

You can import named ranges from a 
worksheet for use as data or input the re- 
quired numbers from the keyboard. Error 
messages and warnings will prevent you 
from making several statistical errors, such 
as forecasting too far ahead with insuffi- 
cient historical periods. Altogether, 1,2,3 
Forecast! is a good value. 


MICROSTAT 

Microstat is a complete statistics package 
with many other features beyond its fore- 
casting capabilities. Despite its thorough- 
ness, though, it is a relatively inexpensive 
piece of software, 

Microstat assumes that you know how 
to create a forecast. However, you don’t 
need to know the software well to generate 
forecasts; someone completely unfamiliar 
with Microstat could follow the clear 
menus and obtain useful output. The man- 
ual is clear on the operation of the pro- 
gram, although it offers no training in sta- 
tistics. 

In addition to time series, Microstat 
will do descriptive statistics, hypothesis 
testing, crosstabs and chi-squares, and oth- 
er frequently used procedures. More than 
30 kinds of data transformations can be se- 
lected from a menu. Moving averages, de- 
seasonalizadon, and exponential smooth- 
ing can all be employed to achieve a better 
forecast. 

Microstat is an excellent, straightfor- 
ward package. It will print out presentable 
graphs that include appropriate statistical 
figures at the bottom. It can use large data 
sets. Although it doesn’t offer many so- 
phisticated procedures, Microstat will 
meet all business forecasting and some 
even more specialized needs. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
214 



STATGRAPHICS 



Powerful Statistics, Sophisticated Graphics 
In One Complete ^ftware System 


STATGRAPHICS from STSC is simply 
the most complete and powerful statis- 
tical software available for your PC. 
STATGRAPHICS integrates powerful 
statistics with high-resolutlon color 
graphics— in one single software 
system— to give you an extraordinarily 
powerful analytical environment. 

“ISTATGRAPHICSI is unusually 
compMe as software systems go 
in terms of statistical capabilities.” 

(PC Week) 

With more than 250 statistical and math- 
ematical procedures, STATGRAPHICS 
offers you the power and precision of 
mainframe software— right on your PC. 

All the tools you need for comprehensive 
statistical analysis: ANOVA, complete 
regression analysis, experimental design, 
quality control procedures, multivariate 
techniques, nonparametric methods, and 
extensive forecasting and time series 
analysis. Including Box-Jenkins. 


“i’ve found STATGRAPHICS to be 
one of the most complete and 
easy-tOHJse statistics programs 
that I have come acn^s." 

(Whole Earth Software Catalog) 


All this statistical power Is even 
more valuable with STATGRAPHICS’ 
unique interactive environment. 
STATGRAPHICS is completely menu- 
driven so you can get into your 
statistical analysis work quickly and 
be productive right from the start. You 
can easily go back and forth between 
your numerical and graphical analysis- 
change variables as many times as you 
want— and see the effect immediately. 


You can also enter and access data easily. 
STATGRAPHICS has a full-screen data 
editor and interfaces with standard ASCII 
files, Lotus® 1-2-3® and Symphony® work- 
sheets, and dBASE® files. 


STATGRAPHICS— the best overall choice! 



Integrated 

Statistical 

Graphics 

Direct 1 

Lotus & dBASE 
Interfaces 

Menu- 

)riven 

Minimum 

Hardware 

Required 

Helpline 

Support 

U.S- 

Suggested 
Retail Price 

STATGRAPHICS 



Dual Floppy 
Disk 


S79i 

I* 

SPSS/PC +'■ 

NO 

NO 

NO 

10 Meg 

Hard Disk 


S138 

5 

SAS'/PC 

NO 

NO 


20 Meg 

Hard Disk 


12700+ Annual 
Maintenance 
Pee 


“Verdicb [STATGRAPHICS is] a 
model PC software system which 
will set standards for PC statistical 

software.” (PC User Magazine) 

STATGRAPHICS offers you a wide variety 
of graphics capabilities to help you 
visually analyze your data— more options 
and more sophistication than any other 
PC statistical software. Included are 
histograms, two- and three-dimensional 
line and surface plots, scatter plots, time 
sequence plots, quality control charts, 
as well as bar and pie charts. 
STATGRAPHICS supports a wide range 
of graphics boards, printers, and plotters. 

For the most complete, advanced statis- 
tical graphics software system available, 
order STATGRAPHICS today. To order, 
contact your local dealer. It they don’t 
have it, tell them to call STSC toll-free. 

(SOO) S92-OOSO 

In Maryland or Canada call (301 ) 984<5123. 


SISC 

Available nationally through Sofisel. Micro Central, 
and distributors vrorldwide Dealer inquiries welcome. 

*ln1«(Ttational prkM slightly higfwr. STATGRAPHICS, 

SAS. and dBASE or* regist*r«d trodemorfcs of Slotltticol 
Grophict Corporation. SAS Instituto Inc., and Ashlon*Tot«. 
rospoctively. lotus. 1 -3-3. or>d Symphony or* rogislorod 
trodomorfcs of Lotus Oovolopment Corp. PlUS'WAftC ond 
SPSS/PC -I- or» trodemorks of STSC. Inc. ond SPSS Inc., 
respoclively. 

A PIUS^WARE"* PRODUa 


Data compiled as ot AptU 1966 


CIRCLE 244 ON READER SERVICE CARD 








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EXEC*U*STAT 

Exec*U*Slal is a general-purpose fore- 
casting program for the busy executive. 
It's one of the best examples around of a 
full-featured program that is accessible to 
someone with little background in the dis- 
cipline. In fact, it makes an effort to edu- 
cate you as you go along. 

For example, in the statistical world, 
"nonparametric procedures” ate those 
used with samples when you don't want to 
make the assumption that they came from 
a ‘ ‘normal distribution ." One of these pro- 
cedures is called a ‘ ‘ Wilcoxon signed rank 
test for paired samples. ' ' That name 
wouldn't mean a thing to someone with lit- 


■ Exec*U*Stat’s 
help screens actually 
teach you the principles 
involved in each 
procedure. 


tie or no statistics background, nor would 
the name of the category of statistics in- 
volved, So Exec*U*Stat lists the proce- 
dure on its menu as “testing for a differ- 
ence between two samples”; the menu 
also shows the correct statistical designa- 
tion underneath. 

Exec*U*Stal's help screens actually 
leach you the principles involved in each 
procedure and tell you what results are 
considered good or bad. Although the pro- 
gram doesn't include every feature profes- 
sional statisticians might want, it's surpris- 
ingly complete. To such standard 
forecasting tools as descriptive methods 
and hypothesis testing, it adds a number of 
forecasting procedures, including the gen- 
eration of seasonal subseries plots, a fea- 
ture not found in most packages. This 
graph illustrates the average of each season 
with a horizontal line. Vertical lines that 
run from each data value to its correspond- 
ing seasonal average help you discern pat- 
terns. Exec*U*Stat\ graphics, on the 
whole, are excellent. 


The program handles financial fore- 
casting with such features as internal rate 
of return and depreciation curves. An Ex- 
ecutive Desk module included with the 
package adds a calculator, calendar, tele- 
phone book, alarm clock, and scratch pad. 

Exec*U*Stat's biggest drawback is its 
2-minute loading time. After that, it moves 
at a reasonable clip. 


MINITAB 

Minitab was originally developed in 1972 
as a tool for teaching statistics to university 
students. It has been used extensively on 
both minis and micros. 

The current PC version, which has files 
dated 1984, will make those who've used 
mainframe terminals feel comfortable and 
right at home. It gives you the current date 
when you sign on and then waits for you to 
issue a command. The command language 
uses English words for the most part, but it 
will still take getting used to. For example, 
if you want to leave the program, you're 
likely to try typing “quit” or “end” or 
“finish,” but only the conunand “stop” 
will get you out of the package. Although 
help screens are available, to make the best 
use of the Minitab you must leam the com- 
mands. 

The documentation is good, and if you 
want to go further, you can buy two addi- 
tional books that will help you leam the 
program and teach you statistics as well; a 
Minitab student handbook, complete with 
exercises, and Statistics for Business with 
Minitab. 

Minitab’s time series forecasting mod- 
ule was added recently and is not covered 
in the handbook. It includes the Box-Jen- 
kins methodology, a procedure popular 
with advanced statisticians that is general- 
ly found in only the most-sophisticated 
packages. Some of the more-advanced 
transformations, however, are not avail- 
able. 

The package has a definite mainframe 
“feel.” The graphs it produces are com- 
posed of letters of the alphabet. The screen 
display is black and white. However, you 
can get color by using your ANSI driver 
through a BASIC program to change your 
screen colors at the E)OS level or by using 
The Norton Utiiities program that accom- 


F A C T FILE 




Exec*lJ*SttU 
Exec*U*Sial Inc. 
Research Park. 2 
Wall St. 

Princeton, NJ 08540 
(609)924-9357 
List Price: S495 
Requires: 320K 
RAM. two disk drives. EX)S 2.0 ot later. 
coliM'/graphics card. 

In Short: An excellent, full-featured pack- 
age for the beginner. Completely menu- 
driven, with help screens that teach statisti- 
cal theory. Copy protected. 

CIRCLE 664 ON READER SERVICE CARD ~ 

□ Miniiab 

Minilab Inc. 

308 1 Enterprise Dr. 
Slate College. PA 
16801 

(814)238-3280 
List Price: $1,000 
(“fundamental” ver- 
sion, $500) 

Requires: 320K RAM. two disk drives. 
DOS 2.0 or later. 

In Short: A general. urKomplicated pack- 
age with a mainframe feel that hits the main 
area.s of statistics with little depth. A com- 
mand-driven approach makes Miniiah 
somewhat difncuil to leam. but supporting 
textbooks are available. Copy protected. 
ciRg^eeaoN RE>^RkRviCE card 

SmarlFortcasis II 
Smart Software Inc. 
392 Concord Ave. 
Belmont. MA 02 1 78 
(617)489-2743 
List Price: $695 
(“Trainer” version. 
$ 10 ) 

Requires: 256K RAM, two disk drives. 
DOS 2.0 or later, color'graphics card. Ep- 
son or IBM Proprinter or compatible. 

In Short: This ba.sically menu-driven fore- 
casting package fcM' executives offers an 
automatic operation nxxie. It's command 
driven, but yiHir choices appear on screen at 
ail times. Niti copy protected. 

CIRCLE 662 ON READER SERVICE CARO 



plishes the same purpose. 

Minitab is a reliable program that can 
introduce you to many forecasting proce- 
dures. A “fundamental" version aimed at 
statistics novices is also available; priced at 
$500, it is considerably less expensive 
than the advanced version and may meet 
your needs. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
218 







I 

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Conua techf«.dUsu|von vtJOium M 
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Telex 510601 6264 RED RIVER TECH 


Other Products: 

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■ BUSINESS FORECASTING 


SMARTFORECASTS II 

SmartForecasts II, strictly a forecasting 
program, lives up to its name. This clever- 
ly concocted program uses a command 
language with a welcome twist: the 
choices available are shown at the bottom 
of the screen at all times, eliminating all 


FACT FILE 


■ Stalpro 

Penton Software Inc. 
420 Lexinglon Ave., 
#2846 

New York. NY 10017 
(212)878-%00 
List Price: $795 
Requires: 256K 

RAM, two disk drives, DOS 2.0 (x* later, 
culor/graphics card. 

In Short: A complete, high-level statistics 
package, with menus and documentation to 
help those who don’t know statistics get 
around. Siatpro has unusual graphics capa- 
bilities. Copy (xotected. 

CIRCLE m ON READER SERVICE CARO 

SYSTAT 
SYSTATlnc. 

2902 Central St. 
Evanston, IL6020I 
(312) 864-5670 
List Price: $595 
Requires: 256K 
RAM. two disk drives. 

In Short: SKSTAT U a highly regarded 
general statistics package with powerful 
forcca.sting abilities. A good m^uol makes 
it usable by people with limited .statistics 
knowledge. Copy protected (unprotected 
version. SlOextra). 

CIRCLE e>0 ON READER SERVICE CARO 


BMDPC 

BMDP Statistical Soft- 
ware Inc. 

1964 Westwood 
Blvd..#2Cr2 
Los Angeles. CA 
90025 

(213)475-5700 
LLsI Price: $450 to $1500 
Requires: 640K RAM. 5-Mbytc hard disk 
drive. 8087 math coprocessor chip, DOS 
2.0 OT later. 

In Short: A comprehensive mainframe 
package now available for PCs. Separate 
modules let you choose the specific proce- 
dures you need. Cc^y protected. 

C1RCL£87»0NRCADERSERVICECARD ~~ 




DOS 2.0 or later. 



Hinteir^s i i\ay., ) 



82:Q2 


If you wish. 
SmartForecasts U will 
automatically pit 
various forecast 
models against each 
other and show you 
only the result of its 
work. The end product 
is a vivid graph like 
this one. 

The corfidence intervtd 
appears in yellow at 
the right of the plot. 


87:Q4 


Fl=Sfit'ap)i F3=taJ>le F4=if'ank F5=pi('nt F8=an 
F2,6,7S9 =s _ 


::save . pesul ts( Press Enter) Esc 


memory work while you leam the pack- 
age. Tutorials make the learning process 
even easier. 

SmartForecasts // can make predic- 
tions automatically from your data: the 
program conducts a “tournament,” pit- 
ting various forecast tiKxlels against each 
other. It then graphs the winner automati- 
cally, but it also shows you the other meth- 
ods it tried, along with the percentages by 
which they were proven inferior to the 
winner for the data in question. 

Once you load your data Trie with the 
Read command, you can go immediately 
into forecast mode, in which your choices 
include several professional techniques in 
addition to the automatic process de- 
scribed above. Beautiful graphs in vivid 
colors will appear on color monitors, com- 
plete with the confidence interval in a dif- 
ferent color. Help screens teach statistical 
theory and give examples. 

SmartForecasts II is a landmark pro- 
gram for the novice. It does not include ad- 
vanced procedures such as Box- Jenkins, 
but it wasn't written for a sophisticated 
market. 


STATPRO 

Menu-driven Statpro is a worthy candidate 
for the company that wants to buy one sta- 
tistical package that everybody can use. A 
manual and a textbook are available to 
teach those who don’t know statistics. 
Those who do know what they want can 
fmd it quickly through the menus and will 


be pleasantly surprised at the depth of the 
choices presented. 

Statpro’s time series capabilities in- 
clude graphing Box-Jenkins identifica- 
tions. Other forecasting options are mov- 
ing averages and variances; additive or 
multiplicative seasonal series analysis; ex- 
ponential smoothing; multistage, polyno- 
mial, and trigonometric least-squares pro- 
cedures; and multiplicative decomposi- 
tion, which breaks the data into 
components for further study. For what-if 
analysis you can even duplicate records 
with dummy incremental fields. 

Statpro offers advanced multivariate al- 
gorithms for cluster and factor analysis, 
canonical correlation, matrix determinants 
and inverses, discriminant function analy- 
sis, and multiple contingency analysis, to 
mention a few. Its procedures, like cross- 
tabs, are fiill-featured: calculations are in- 
cluded in the printout for Cramer’s V, col- 
umn- and row-variable-dependent 
lambdas, Fisher’s exact test, and other op- 
erations with strange names dear to the 
hearts of statisticians. 

Statpro's graphs are amazing in their 
scope: unusual types such as circular star 
plots and Andrew’s Fourier plots are of- 
fered as a matter of course. The [xogram 
draws plots of mathematical functions and 
will allow such niceties as the superimpo- 
sition of one regression line on top of an- 
other. 

This versatile package provides for re- 
placement of default formulas with ones of 
your own choosing. In fact, you can create 
a library of up to 300 custom data conver- 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
220 



sions that you can use at will. 

If you’re in the market for a general- 
purpose stat program, Stalpro is first-rate. 


SYSTAT 

SYSTAT, the brainchild of Professor Ice- 
land Wilkinson, has attracted a real fol- 
lowing over the years for what was origi- 
nally intended as a PC substitute for 
mainframe programs. While most of those 
mainframe packages are now showing up 
in PC versions, SYSTAT has expanded in 
the other direction and is now itself in use 
on some of the big machines. 

Like other sophisticated statistical pro- 
grams — the kind statisticians love — SYS- 
TAT may be more complicated than people 
with a limited math and statistics back- 
ground will want. But SYSTAT has a big, 
fat manual to help you, and the program’s 
forecasting power makes it worthwhile to 
wade through the manual . 

SYSTATs forecasting capabilities en- 
compass two general types of procedures, 
“time domain,” which covers forecasting 
techniques like Box-Jenkins, and “fre- 
quency domain,” or spectral analysis. 

Recent additions have included a full 
discriminant analysis module, cluster anal- 
ysis, and a nonlinear module with least- 
squares, logit, probit, and other nonlinear 
models. It also has the less esoteric formu- 
las for descriptive statistics and other tech- 
niques readily understood by those without 
doctorates in statistics. 

SYSTAT uses a command language that 
you must leam in order to best use the 
package. If you do make the effort to mas- 
ter this program, you’ll find it rewarding. 


BMDPC 

This general statistical package originated 
on a UCLA mainframe in 1%1 under the 
direction of Professor W. J. Dixon, who 
still guides its development. The complete 
program consists of 40 procedures, of 
which 29 are available for the PC (though 
the procedures can be purchased in smaller 
“groups”). The full 29 modules occupy 
50 floppy disks. 

Like SYSTAT, BMDPC boasts both 
spectral analysis and time series for fore- 


casting, including the Box-Jenkins tech- 
niques. A giant manual with very small 
type explains the theoiy behind each pro- 
cedure and the computing steps necessary 
to accomplish it, with examples. 

The king-sized program will make you 
feel like you’re working on a mainframe, 
both in the way the commands work and in 


the tremendous scope of the applications 
available. Famous statisticians have donat- 
ed their time to the development of the var- 
ious modules, which makes BMDPC seem 
more like a collection of procedures than a 
unified program. Even the manual was 
written by many authors in many different 
styles. The advantage to this arrangement 


Business Forecasting Software: 
Summary of Features 


Product 

List pries 

1 

Command or meno 

8087 coprocessor 

A 

m 

-C 

5 

Cases 

Data points 

S 

• 

• 

M 

e 

« 

1,2.3 

UiD Forecast! 

$89.95 

Forecast 

Menu 

Supported 

10 

150 

1,500 

No 

RATS 

$200 

Econo- 

metric 

Command 

Supported 

• 

• 

45,000 

Yes 

Gauss 

$250 

Econo- 

metric 

Command 

Required 

90 

100,000 

t 

By 

formula 

Microstat 

$375 

General 

Menu 

No 

80 

400 

32,000 

No 

BMDPC 

$450- 

$1,500 

General 

Command 

Required 

* 

• 

64KRAM 

Yes 

Exec'U'Slat 

$495 

General 

Command 

Supported 

• 

• 

4,000 

No 

Forecast Plus 

$595 

Forecast 

Menu 

Supported 

30 

1,000 

30,000 

Yes 

mIcroTSP 

$595 

Econo- 

metric 

Command 

Supported 

300 

• 

32,000 

Yes 

SORITEC 

$595 

Econo- 

metric 

Command 

Required 

85 

100 

8,500 

Yes 

SYSTAT 

$595 

General 

Command 

Supported 

200 

t 

t 

Yes 

nTD Smart- 
1 Forecasts II 

$695 

Forecast 

Menu 

No 

45 

165 

7,425 

No 

ESP 

$795 

Econo- 

metric 

Command 

Supported 

10 

1,000 

8,000 

Yes 

nTD Forecast 
LiilJ Master 

$795 

Forecast 

Menu 

Supported 

15 

2,000 

30,000 

Yes 

Statpro 

$795 

General 

Menu 

Supported 

72 

t 

32,000 

Partial 

IFPS/Peisonal 

$895 

Financial 

Both 

Supported 

300 

• 

32,000 

No 

Mlnitab 

$1,000 

General 

Command 

Supported 

• 

• 

8,000 

Yes 

*Limitod only by total of data points. 

^nDited by disk space 

j Indicates Editorb Choice 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
221 


► •m 


Leasing Options • Service Solutions 

Low Monthly Payments, Purchase Options. One Year On Site Service Available, Call For Details 


PC-XT 


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Purchase Price 

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■ BUSINESS FORECASTING 


is that each module is written and ex- 
plained by an expert in that procedure. Too 
often, programs have noticeable weak- 
nesses when authors and programmers 
stray beyond their personal areas of exper- 
tise in an attempt to cover the entire field. 
This is not a problem here. 

Taken as a whole, BMDPC is top-notch 
work. It’s a huge statistical system in 
which you could theoretically lose your- 
self forever, and additional modules will 
be added from the mainframe version as 
time goes by. Since any module can be in- 
stalled individually, you can limit your 
hard disk storage to the procedures you use 
regularly. Some single procedures occupy 
more than one floppy. Once you install 
them on a hard disk, they ate rejoined by a 
special utility included with the program. 

BMDPC has life tables and survival 
analysis modules of interest to medical and 
insurance professionals, a feature not of- 
fered by most competitors. 

This program is another one that comes 
in black and white but will accept any 
screen colors you cate to impose through 
DOS. If your statistical work covers the 
whole gamut of procedures, not just fore- 
casting, you'll need a complete package. 
This is the most complete one around. 


RATS 

The catchy name RATS stands for Regres- 
sion Analysis of Time Series, but this 
economeuic forecasting package’s litera- 
ture abounds in cartoons featuring rodents 
in action. RATS is notable for its ability to 
handle large data sets, for its flexibility, 
and for the advanced procedures it offers. 
At least one of the other statistical pack- 
ages reviewed here admits (with proper 
credit offered) that it uses algorithms de- 
veloped by Robert Litterman, one of 
RATS' s two authors. 

RATS has had a reputation for being 
hard to leam. Now VAR Econometrics has 
added E-Z-RATS, which will write appli- 
cations in the RATS programming lan- 
guage automatically from menus. You 
don’t even have to read the 3(X)-page man- 
ual to use it. This arrangement offers the 
best of both worlds: novices don’t have to 
choose between buying a low-powered 
package they can handle but will soon out- 


i^FACT FILE 


RATS 

VAR Econometiics 
Inc. 

P.O. Box 19334 
Minneapolis, MN 
554194)334 
(612)822-9690 

Urt Price: $200 

(demo $40) 

Requires: 256K RAM, two disk drives, 
E)OS 2.0 ex' later, cotor/graphics card. 

In Short* A state-of-the-art econometrics 
package with an autom^ appUcaiions 
generator. /MTSiscomnumd-drivoi widi a 
pn^ramming language. C^omes with £-Z- 
A471S for novices. Not copy protected. 
CffCLE STS ON READER SEflVICE CARD 

Gbirtt 

Applied Teduiical 
Systems 
P.O: Box 6487 
Kent, WA 98064 
(206)631-6679 
List Prke: $250 
Requires: 25^ 

RAM, <me disk drive, IX)S 2.0 or later, 
8087 or 80287 math coproces s or. 

In Short: An advanced package employ- 
ing a programming language based on ma- 
trix algeixa. Heavy m^ badeground is re- 
quired. Not copy protected. 

ORCl£ STTON READER SgtVICE CARD 




Rr0makm 

Wljg 


grow or purchasing a sophisticated pro- 
gram it will take forever to leam. They can 
get started doing real work with E-Z-RATS 
while studying the RATS language on the 
side. 


RATS can import or export 1-2-3 work- 
sheet files directly, in addition to recogniz- 
ing ASen, DIF, and other standard for- 
mats. You can also buy a Cambridge 
Planning macroeconomic database for it 
that includes 188 frequently used time se- 
ries that can be up^ted monthly. Full 
spectral analysis capabilities are among its 
forecasting features, which also include 
two- and three-stage least-squares, probit 
and logit models, and the Kalman Filter for 
estimating state-space models. State space 
is a forecasting technique that exploits the 
relationship of time series techniques to an 
advanced procedure called canonical cor- 
relation analysis. 

A RATS version that can accommodate 
up to 7,800 double-precision numbers 
with 14 digits of accuracy is available for 
only $200. The large version is $100 more 
and ups the file size to 45,000 data points. 
Both are outstanding values if you’re look- 
ing for a friendly, command-^ven pack- 
age with a versatile language and state-of- 
the-art forecasting procedures. 


GAUSS 

Like RATS. Gauss is inexpensive and 
powerful . It's not for beginners unless they 
have a heavy math background. Forecast- 
ing with Gauss requires a comprehensive 
knowledge of algrebra — not the common, 
garden variety most of us had in high 
school, but matrix algebra. Mathemati- 
cians find it a delight. 

The basic unit of its programming lan- 



Gauss is an advanced 
statistical program for 
users with strong 
math backgrounds. 
This screen illustrates 
a singular value 
decomposition with 
eigenvalues — 
heavy stuff, 
for the higher-math 
crowd only. 


Ins L:22 ::3 filerCOmfil 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
226 



WeVe continually improved Microstat since it was introduced in 1978. 
and the latest release includes many new features you've wanted. 


Interactive and Batch Processing 
Expanded Data Management 
^bsystem with New Data 
Transforms 

Reading data files created by other 
programs (e.g . Lotus) 

3 types of Analysis of VariarKre 
Time Series 

Crosstabs and Chi-Square 
Factorials. Premutations, and 
Combinations 
Hypothesis Tests 


Data sets that can exceed memory 
Multiple Regression (irtcludir^g 
Stepwis^ 

Scatterplots (Including best fit 
regression) 

Correlation Analysis 
12 Nonparametric tests 
8 Probability Distributions 
Descriptive Statistics 
Easy Installation 


Microstat's algorithms have been designed to prevent nurr»eric overflow errors and 
yield unsurpassed occurocy. Microstat's price is $376,000 including the user's 
manual and is available for the Z80. 8086, 8088 CPU's arxJ CP/M80. CP/M86, MS- 
DOS. and PC-DOS. To order, call or write. 



Ecosoft, Inc. 

6413 N College Avenue 
Indianapolis. IN 46220 
(317)256-6476 •8:30-4:30 


1-800-952-0472 
(orders only) 



Trademarks: Microstat (Ecosoft). CP/M (Digital Research). MS-DOS (Microsoft). 
PC-DOS (IBM). Z80 (Zilog). 8086. 8088. d0186. 80286 (Intel). 


CIRCLE 270 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


Forecasting and Statistical Analysis 


StatPac” 

the proven statistical analysis package 
'The standard far business and Industry 
for over six years. Comprehensive and 
easy to use. StatPac is a full-featured 
statistical package for professional 
researchers. 

StatPac Gold " 

our top-of-the-iine statistics package 
An enhanced version of StatPac 
featuring windows, graphics, and 
command programming language. 
StatPac Gold is the most advanced 
statistical package available. 


Forecast Plus ' 

a time-series analysis forecasting tool 
A combination of data management, 
exploratory graphics, and over a dozen 
forecasting techniques, make Forecast 
Plus the most powerful time-series 
package available. It works fast, 
accurately and automatically. 

Goodness-of-Ht ' 

a regression package tor 
model building 

A full-featured regression package for 
professional researchers. Command 
driven with versatile programming 
language. 


Call for complete information: 1 -800-328-4907 
WMONICK ASSOCIATES 

6500 Nicollet Ave. S., Minneapolis, MN 55423 

(612) 866-9022 



CIRCLE 132 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST I 
227 


HIGH SPEED 
TAPE BACKUP 
NOW $475 

Alliance Tfechnology of Sunny- 
vale, CA has broken the $500 price 
barrier with a high speed, high per- 
formance streaming tape system 
able to back up an entire 20MB hard 
disk on an XT or AT computer in less 
than five minutes for $475. 

“Our 25MB and 60MB systems 
are high speed systems similar to 
those sold by Alloy, Everex, 
Maynard, Sysgen and Tbcmar,” said 
Alliance Technology president 
Jochen Schude. “We all buy the same 
hardware but Alliance’s window 
oriented software is significantly 
more powerful than others. Our 
direct marketing channel is more ef- 
ficient so the end user pays less than 
$500 for features ordinarily selling 
for $900 to $1,500. Our technical 
support department is the very 
best.” 



“Our user prices are about the 
same as floppy tape systems from 
Irwin, Peachtree 'Ibchnology, and 
Interdyne, but our backup time is 
dramatically faster and the hard- 
ware reliability is much greater.” 

The Alliance systems can do high 
speed image, partition, or file by file 
backups with read-after-write 
verify. “Our window oriented soft- 
ware utility is compatible with more 
systems, easier to use, and 
resembles Lotus’ 1-2-3 menu,” ex- 
plained Schude. “Our tape con- 
trollers are short length cards, and 
the tape drives are 5.25 inch half 
height.” 

Alliance also sells a $575 portable 
backup system similar to the 
Maynard Maynstream that can be 
moved from one office to another to 
back up any number of XT’s and 
ATs. 60MB cartridge tape systems 
(similar to Everex’s) are $675. 

2SMB Streaming llipe Subsystem-$475. 

60MB Cartridge ’Ikpe Subsystem-$675. 
(extra controllers $139.) 

Alliance Tbchnology, Inc. 510 Lawrence 

Expy, Suite 210, Sunnyvale, CA 94086. 

(800) 621-0854 ext. 700 or (408) 727-6200. 

CIRCLE 494 ON READER SERVICE CARD 
(adutrtisement) 


9 S 6 


guage is a matrix. Users accustomed to 
higher math will Htid it easy to learn be- 
cause the commands employ formulas 
with standard syntax. Gauss will process 
giant data sets and requires an 8087 chip to 
do its work. The numerical algorithms are 
coded in assembly language, and the pro- 
gram is much faster than the IBM APL lan- 
guage. It will create a SO by SO matrix of 
uniform random numbers in less than half 
a second. 

Gauss has a built-in, fiill-screen editor 
and dozens of applications programs for 
many popular procedures. These proce- 
dures include four optimization algo- 
rithms, options for computing gradients, 
and a maximum likelihood module. The 
versatility of the language makes it a valu- 
able tool for a host of statistical purposes in 



FACT 


FILE 


Forecast Master 
Scientific Systems Inc, 
One AlcwifePI.. 

35 Caml^idgeparic Dr, 
Cambridge. MA 
02140 

(617)661-6364 
List Price: $795 
Requires: 5 1 2K RAM . one disk drive. 
DOS 2.0 or later, color/graphics card. 8087 
coprocessor recommended. 

In Short: An impressive combination of 
advanced forecasting procedures with 
menus to guide the novice. Not copy pro- 
teaed. 

CinCLE676QNREADERS£RVICECARO ~ 

ESP 

Economica Inc. 

2067 Massachusetts 
Avc. 

Cambridge. MA 
02140 

(617)661-3260 
llsi Price: $795; 
multi-equation version. $1,295 
Requires: 320K RAM. two disk drives. 
DOS2.0orlater.color/graphicscard. Sup- 
ports only IBM graphics printer w compa- 
tibles for graphics printout. Multiequation 
"model simulation" version requires 
5 1 2K RAM and either the 8087 or the 
80287 math coprocessor. 

In Short: An established command-driven 
ecofK>mctric software package with excel- 
lent graphics and interactive tutorials. 
Copyprotected. 

ci^LE 67$ ON READER SERVICE CARD 





Graphics are well 
integrated into ESP, 
a solid econometrics 
package. This us^l 
graph shows 
a regression line and 
residuals. 


addition to forecasting. 

The developers are working on a menu- 
driven program to increase the base of po- 
tential Gauss users. 


FORECAST MASTER 

Forecast Master is one package that does 
not force you to enter the developer’s tight 
little world or learn the developer's lan- 
guage in order to express preferences. The 
software runs entirely through colorful 
menus, with soundly based defaults avail- 
able to guide beginners. Advanced users 
can enter their own formulas. The result is 
little short of a miracle when you consider 
that its author is dealing with sotiie of the 
most advanced material in the forecasting 
fteld. 

Forecast Master was written by Dr. 
Robert L. Goodrich, who received his 
Ph.D. in stochastic systems from Harvard. 
Most people don’t even know what “sto- 
chastic” means (the adjective implies the 
presence of a random variable). He has 
written many papers on time series analy- 
sis and is the coauthor of a key algorithm in 
the field of state space. The publisher of 
Forecast Master is Scientific Systems 
Inc., whose president. Dr. Raman K. 
Mehta, developed a pioneering state-space 
algorithm in conjunction with H. Akaike. 

State space is only one of seven fore- 
casting models from which you can 
choose. The others are Box-Jenkins, 
Bayesian vector autoregression, AUTO- 
PRO regression (an econometric module 


designed by bngle and Grainger of the 
University of Galifomia, San Diego), sea- 
sonal decomposition, exponential smooth- 
ing, and curve fitting. The last two tech- 
niques will permit the use of samples as 
small as ten observations. 

Forecast Master includes excellent in- 
tegrated graphics and even lets you specify 
and use your own word processor or editor 
within the program to create or edit data 
fries. An audit trail preserves all matrices 
calculated. 

Although it doesn’t offer spectral anal- 
ysis, Forecast Master is highly recom- 
mended for those who want the ultimate in 
an easy-to-use time-series program that 
doesn’t sacrifice thoroughness or power. 

ESP 

The letters ESP stand for Econometric 
Software Package, and ESP is one of the 
standard offerings in the field. The soft- 
ware was acquired recently by Econo- 
mica, a fum that also has several subscrip- 
tion data packages relating to the 
economy. The basic $795 version permits 
you to forecast single-equation models; the 
$ 1 ,295 model-simuladon version for solv- 
ing multiequation models will handle up to 
256 equations. 

ESP is command-driven and comes 
with good documentation and tutorials to 
get you started. Its advanced capabilities 
include three-stage least-squares problems 
and nonlinear estimation using the Gauss- 
Seidel solution technique. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1985 
228 






TEMPLATE SERIES 


"^Answers at your fingertips.*' 


• The 10 function k^s are * A handy display of • The Mir>i-Manual isa 

directly referenoad Colors commaryte. rnenu speaaity condertsed 

are used to indicate if a key 18 structures, key assignrr>ent8 software quide containing 
to be used in conjunction ar>d cursor control refererKes. examples arid 

with the Alt. Ctrl, or Shift key information is at your tables needed most often 



Designed to fit IBM (PC. XT. AT). Compaq arid rrxist compatable PC's 


WordPerfect 4 0 4 1 

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Lotus 1-2-3 

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12.95 


Include $3.00 per order for shipping & handlir>g. 


CIRC IE 532 ON READER SERVICE CARD 

445-A Carlisle Or. Herndon. VA 22070 703 - 437-41 48 



VmMMMS OOWMMTXOV 


mA9m 

Forecasting and 
Statistical Analysis 

NOW AVAILABLE WITH 

A 500-Series Subset of the 
CITIBASE* Economic Data Base 



wtMm 

A COMPLETE ECONOMETRIC PACKAGE: Forecasting and 
Stmuialion, Staiisbcal Artalysis. and Grapnics 
COMPREHENSIVE DATA BASE MANAGEMENT: Time Senes 
and Crosa-Secbon. Reads Many Formats. Daily. Weekly. Monthly. 
Ouartedy or Annual Calendars 

EASY TO USE: Comes wilh E-Z-RATS, a Menu-Driven Program 
Wnter. Irtcludes Dozens of Examoie Programs. Can Execute 
Oirecity From e Hard Disk 

INCREDIBLE POWER: Plenty ol Room For Large Problems. FasI 

and Accurale. Command Dnven. Advanced Techniques such as 

ARIMA. Probit and Logil, A Complete 500-Page Manual Details 

Nearly 200 Commar>ds nvitn Hundreds of Options 

RATS IS the Most Popular Econorrtetnc Software Package for One 

Reason — It « the BEST VALUE 

RATS requires 2S6‘K RAM. IBM PC Or Compatible 

BASE PROGRAM: $200 Large Memory Version $300 

Ouanlity and Academic Discounts are Available 

Order Now al 612-622-9690 
MC/VISA accepted 


HIGH DUALITY. UP-TO-DATE: Data from the CITIBANK Data 
Base. irKludes 500 ol the Most Frequently used Economic Data 
Senes Such as INTEREST RATES, the MONEY SUPPLY, the S&P 
500. and Many Other Financial Series. Some GNP ACCOUNTS. 
RETAIL and WHOLESALE TRADE, including CAR SALES. CON- 
SUMER and PRODUCER PRICE INDICES. PRODUCTION. 
EMPLOYMENT, and UNEMPLOYMENT Data, the LEADING 
INDICATORS, and Other Important Economic Time Senes 
FAST. EASY. DIRECT ACCESS AND UPDATING FROM WITHIN 
RATS 

'ClTtBASE IB the rrtecro-economic data base ol CITIBANK 
CITIBASE-MINI Initial Fee $100 

Plus One Time or Annual Update $300 

Quarterly Updates $500 per year 

Monthly Updates $600 per year 


Or write for more inlormalion to 
VAR Econometncs 
PO Box 19334 
Minneapolis. MN 554194)334 


CIRCLE 191 ON READER SERVICE CARD 

PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
229 


ni SOFTWARE 
for every 
PC USER 

The Public Domain SW library offers over 
4000 User-Supported and fully documented 
software programs that run on MS/PC DOS 
operating systems. About 400 different disks 

‘Catalog is on disk and is menu driven for 
you to search for topic areas or description of 
programs 

*Our DISKS have MANY MANY 
programs! 

5-60 programs per disk 

PC*Catalog on two disks (with search & 
sort capability) 

• Catalog A with 0-240 different disks S8 

• Catalog B with 241 and counting up S6 

• SAVE&buytwo $11 

Special Introduction — 1 FREE catalog 
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51 • includes games, printspooler. music, 
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graphics, etc 

SAVE more when you become a MEMBER! 
OnlySIS 

Membership includes I) lower prices 2) 
Newsletter with what's new, computer tips, 
etc and 3) annual update on catalog 

A few selected disks. (Save any two disks Sll) 
EDUCATION; (any two Sll) 

• Math tutor grades ?-6 #24t 

• 3-D algebraic functions, chemistry, 
spelling, etc. #231 

• History tutorial, etc #169 

• Word Processor for children & finance 
programs #263 

• BULLETIN BOARD SYSTEM: 2 disks 
#261, #262 

• Recover LOST FILES #255 

• CATALOGING: Keep files organized 
#257 

• UNPROTECTPOPULARSOFTWARE: 

and 30 rrxDre useful programs #111 

• WORDPROCESSOR: PC Write 
#251-252 

• DATABASE MANAGER #92 

• Professional time billing & invoicing 
#290. 291 

• Mailing Label Package #115 

• Letter Writer — Prints envelopes & 
letters in different ways #301 

• Industrial Eng. Time Study Sheets #303 

• XLISP #109 

• GAMES: Baseball simulation, etc #233. 
Football simulation, etc #236 

FREE Notebook (DOS size) with order of 5 
or rrxDre disks (SI & S2 not included) 

n soc in 10 Rt. 

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tax. Single disks orders S7 

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DEALERS A DISTRIBUTORS INVITED 

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CIRCLE 512 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



■ BUSINESS FORECASTING 


■ IFPS/Personal is easy to 
use, particularly if you are 
familiar with spreadsheet 
programs. 


The program has several convenient 
features not found in most packages. For 
example, you can stop a work session at 
any point and resume it later. You can halt 
an iterative process as often as you wish to 
examine the value of a variable and identi- 
fy equations that do not converge . You can 
rdso execute any other program from with- 
in £S/>. 

Excellent graphics are well integrated 
into the program. Data can be entered from 
the keyboard, or you can import ASCII, 
DIF, SYLK, 1-2-3, or Symphony files. Up 
to 1 ,000 series can be accessed at any one 
time. 

Economists will be very comfortable 
with ESP once they’ve learned the lan- 
guage. Those with little or no econometric 
training will have to work harder to master 
the program. 


IFPS/PERSONAL 

IFPS/Personal is a forecasting package of 
another breed. Its emphasis is on the finan- 


cial aspects of business decision making, 
stressing what-if analysis and goal seek- 
ing, and it is, in fact, built around a spread- 
sheet. Built-in software support lets this 
personal computer version of IFPS com- 
municate with its celebrated mainframe 
version. 

The IFPS/Personal language has func- 
tions that will generate standard statistical 
procedures. For instance, the Trend com- 
mand will cause the program to perform a 
linear regression. Other functions will fig- 
ure continuous rate of return, compound 
growth rate, internal rate of return, net pre- 
sent value, net terminal value, and other 
figures of interest to the corporate control- 
ler. The program offers automatic solution 
of simultaneous equations and logical con- 
solidation of complex models and data. A 
macro facility will let you create your own 
cottunands in addition to those the package 
offers. 

The documentation consists of two fat 
manuals in a standard-height slipcase. One 
book is primarily an explanation of the lan- 
guage and a command summary. The oth- 
er book is devoted entirely to a series of tu- 
torials. IFPS is easy to use, particularly if 
you are familiar with spreadsheet pro- 
grams. The slick color graphics and re- 
ports IFPS generates are appropriate for 
business presentations. 

FORECAST PLUS 

The structure of Forecast Plus is so logical 
that it could serve as a model for designing 


Among 

IFPS/Personal ’5 assets 
is the spreadsheet 
around which it is 
organized. 

Spreadsheet users will 
feel comfortable using 
this package for 
forecasting. 

M 1 ^»i| Wm 

ifii 131 1 ISH 








FACT 


FILE 


IFPS/Personal 
Execucom Systems 
Corp. 

P.O. Box 9758 
Austin. Texas 78766 
(512)346-4980 
List Price: $895 
Requires: 512K 
RAM, two disk drives. DOS 2. 1 or later, 
color/graphics card. Mainframe software 
link provided. 

In Short: A financial forecasting package 
with spreadsheet capabilities and an em- 
phasis on goal seeking. The PC version can 
communicate with the popular mainframe 
version. Copy pmtected. 

CtftClF g74 ON READER SERVICE CARD 

Forecast Plus 
Walonick Associates 
6500 Nicollet Ave, 
South 

Minneapidis, MN 
55423 

(612)866-9022 
List fticc: $595 

(demo. $50) 

Requires: 192K RAM. two disk drives. 
DOS 1.1 or later. 

In Short: Sequential menus lead the user 
through the steps to create accurate fore- 
casts and sophisticated output. The manual 
has excellent tutorial material on statistics. 
Not ci^y protected. 
circle: 673 on reader service card 


Forecast 

Pbs 



forecasting tools. You are advised to gath- 
er your data, create a file, and then use the 
“exploratory package” to find the best 
technique to fit the data you have. You run 
that technique from the “forecasting pack- 
age” and rerun it with modifications until 
you have the optimum results. The manual 
is so clear on every point that it could easi- 
ly double as a beginner’s forecasting text- 
book. 

For example, one notable section of the 
documentation shows small printouts of 
different regression patterns. Each pattern 
is labeled, with the suggested procedures 
to follow conveniently listed beside the 
graph. For the printout marked “No 
Trend — Additive Seasonality,” the docu- 
mentation suggests that you try the follow- 
ing “cures”: Harrison’s harmonic 
smoothing (a variation on our spectral 
analysis or Fourier analysis). Winter’s sea- 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
230 




GUAGES nW ARE CAUSINGJW BKGESr 
RAMMIIK BACKI^IN WStimm ALSO 
HNG NICE BIG HOIB IN OUR POO^. 


LANGUAGES 
PROGT" 

unuG 


Whether it’s BASIC, COBO., 
Pascal, "C”, or a data base manager, 
you’re being held back. 

Held back because the langua^ 
has frustrating limitations, and the 
programming environment isn’t 
mtuitive enoS^ to keep track of 
what you’re working on. 

In the real world, there’s pres- 
sure to do more impressive work, in 
less time, and for more clients. 

Wfe’ve been given some incredibly 
powerful hardware in recent times, 
out the languages aren’t a whole lot 
better than they were 20 years ago. 

So, whatever langua^ you have 
chosen, by now you feJ it s out to 
get you — because it is. 

Sure, no language is perfect, but 
you have to wonder, “Ain I getting 
all I deserve?” 

And, like money, you’ll never 
have enou^. 

Pretty dismal, huh? 
thou ^t too. 

So we did srxnething about it 

Wfe call it CLARION" 

You’ll call it "mcnd^le.” 

Distributed on 7 diskettes, 
CLARICE consists of over 200,000 
lines of code, taking 3+ years to 
hone to “worldclass” performance. 

With CLARION you can 
write, com]^, run and debug 
complex applications in a 
New York afternoon. 

Even if you’re in Savannah. 

It ^es you the power and 
speed to create screens, windows 
and rqxirts of such richness and 
clarity you would never attempt ' 
them with any other language. 

Because you would have to 
write the code. 

With CLARION you simply 
design the screens using our 
SCREENER utility and then 
Clarion writes the source code 
AND compiles it for you in seconds. 

Likewise, you can use 
REPCKTER to create rmorts. 

Remember, only CLARION can 
recompile and display a screen or 
report layout for modification. 

And with no time wasted. 

All the power and facilities you 
need to write great prcKiams, faster 
than you ever dreameaof. 


Programs that are easy to use. 

Programs that are a pleasure to 
write. 

And to you that means true 
satisfaction. 

You’ve coveted those nifty popup 
help windows some major applica- 
tions feature. But you can’t afford 
the time and ener]^ it takes to 
write them into your prcgrams. 

That’s the way it used to be. 

So we fixed that, too. 

CLARION’S HELPER is an 
interactive utility that let’s you 
design the most effective popup 
help screens that you can imagine. 
And they’re “cont^ sensitive” 
meaning you can have help for 
eveiy fidd in your application. 

iSilike the other nucro 
language, CLARION provides 
declarations, procedures, and 

functions to process 
dates, strings, 
screens, reports, 
indexed files, 
DOS files and 
memory tables. 



SArirM 


^CLARION 

1 - 800 - 354-5444 


Imagine making source program 
changes with the CLARICSV EH- 
TC®. A sinfde keystroke termi- 
nates the EDITC®, loads the C(WI- 
PILER, compiles the program, loads 
the PBOCESSOT ana executes the 
prcxpm. ff’s that easy! 

Our data management ca^ili- 
ties are phenomenal. CLARION 
files permit any number d aanpos- 
ite k^ which are updated dynami- 
calN. 

A file may have as many keys as 
it needs. Each Vey may be com- 
posed d any fields in any order. 
And key files are updated when- 
ever the value of the key changes. 

Like SCREENER and RE- 
POfTER, CLARKKs FILER utility 
also has a raece d the CLARKE 
CCAfPOIc lb create a new file, you 
name the Source Module. Then you 
name the Statement Label of a file 
structure within it. 

FILER will also automatically 
rebuild existing files to match a 
changed file structure. K creates a 
new record ftir eveiy existiiK rec- 
ord, copying the existing fields and 
initializing new ones. 

" lunds pretty comdicated, huh? 
Not with clarion’s docu- 
mentation and on-line help 
screens. If you are currently 
conpetent m BASIC, Pascal 
or “C” vou can be writing 
CLARION applications in a 
day. In two days you won’t 
believe the eloquence of your 
CLARION programs. 

Okay, now tor the best part of 
all. You can say it in CLAIuCH^ 
for $295.00-^)lus shipping and 
handling. All you n^ is an IBM® PC, XT, 
AT or true compatible, with 320 KB of 
memoiy, a hard disk dme, and a parallel port. 
And well allow a full 30 day evaluatxxi 
period. If you’re not satisfied with 
CLARION, simply return it in its 
orKinal condition for a full refund. 

fi you’re not quite ready to take 
advantage of this norisk 
opportunity, ask ftir our detailed 16 
color brochure, tt vividly 
illustrates the ele^ce of 
CLARION. Consider it a preview of 
programming in the fiist lane. 

Either way, the 800 call’s a freehie. 


IWMKTMSgfa&IK. ISOiaSrSJyiHUniP P0W»IWiaCllHflM>> 33064 3<lS/785-«55 

IBM is a registered trademark d International Business Machines Corporation. CLARJON^ is a trademark d Barrington Systems, bic. 01966 Ba r r in gton Systems 


ORCLE 150 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


sonal smoothing, robust decomposition, 
generalized adaptive filtering, and Box- 
Jenkins analysis. 

Forecast Plus was written by David 
Walonick, who is also responsible for Sfar- 
pac and Goodness of Fit, two other widely 
accepted statistical packages. Forecast 
Plus presently runs only in black and 
white. Menu-driven throughout, this fore- 
casting package is a praiseworthy accom- 
plishment. 


SORITEC 


Here’s your opportunity to obtain a free 
econometric forecasting package, if 
you’re willing to shell out $25 to cover 
shipping and handling costs. You’re en- 
couraged to copy the software and distrib- 


FACT FILE 


SORITEC 

The Sorites Group Inc. 
P.O. Box 2939 
Springfield, VA22IS2 
(703)569-1400 
LtatPrke: $593 (5am- 
pler.$25) 

Requires: 640K 
RAM, hard disk drive. DOS 2. 1 or later, 
8087 or 80287 math coprocessor, cokx/ 
graphics card. 

In Short: A full-featured econometrics 
package with a versatile programming lan- 
guage. The developer offers a fiee subset 
vosioa to get you acquainted with the sys- 
tem. Copy protected (Sampler version not 
copy protected). 

CWafTaONREACCRSERVlCgCAfO 

mieroTSP 
(Quantitative Micro 
Software 

4521 Campus Dr., 
#336 

Irvine, CA 92715 
(714)856-3368 
List Price: $595 
Requires: 384K RAM, two disk drives. 
DOS l.Oorlater.color/grai^ucs card, and 
IBM- or Epson-compatible printer needed 
for graphics. 

In Short: A powerful ec(NK)metrics pack- 
age for professionals, with a good tutorial 
and a well-organized manual. microTSP is 
command driven, and its commands are not 
difficult to learn. Copy protected. 

ORCLE aw ON READER SERVICeCAflO 





A color! graphics 
module is the latest 
addition to SORITEC, 
an econometrics 
package with a host of 
other features. This 
time series plot 
demonstrates the new 
module's ct^Mbilities. 



In microTSP, a 
comprehensive and 
sophisticated 
econometrics package 
ported from a 
mainframe 

environment, data and 
graphics are well 
integrated. In this 
example, residual 
figures are shown on 
the right, next to a 
scrolling plot of 
the data. 


ute it to all of your friends. The free pro- 
gram in question is The SORITEC 
Sampler, a fully functional subset of The 
Sorites Group’s more comprehensive 
SORITEC package. This subset alone is 
comparable to other econometric pro- 
grams costing hundreds of dollars. Why 
does The Sorites Group give it away? To 
demonstrate the advantages of its language 
and to interest you in its complete package, 
which was developed in 1978 and is now 
installed on 22 different kinds of main- 
frame, mini, and micro systems. The 
SORITEC Sampler includes an 88-page 
manual that you print out from a disk. 

The complete $595 version of SORI- 
TEC will process multiple-equation mod- 
els, including static or dynamic simulation 
and solutions of nonlinear sets of simulta- 
neous equations. It also manages Fourier 
transform methods, maximum-likelihood 


estimation, three-stage least-squares, and 
financial functions such as the interpola- 
tion and derivation of capital stock series 
with the derivation of related statistics such 
as depreciation and net capital investment. 
A color/graphics module has recently been 
added. 

The manual is thorough but makes it 
quite clear — to the point of carrying a dis- 
claimer — that it is not intended as a text- 
book to teach you either statistics or eco- 
nomics. It does, however, suggest sources 
from which you can gain this necessary 
background. 


microTSP 

The TSP in microTSP stands for Time Se- 
ries Processor, and micro means that it’s 
the PC version of yet another mainframe 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
232 




Doesn’t your IBM PC deserve IBM service? 


You chose an IBM Personal Computer for 
lots of good reasons. And now that you depend 
on it to help keep your office running smoothly, 
doesn’t it make sense to help protect your 
investment with blue chip service from IBM? 

No matter what IBM PC you have, blue 
chip service is more than just exjjert repair. 

Blue chip service offers the choice of ser- 
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for you. It means we’ll exchange your monitor, 
for example, at your place or at any of our 
Service/ Exchange Centers, 

And blue chip service means a lot of things 
you don’t see. Quality. Speed. Commitment. 
And IBM experience. Every year IBM invests 
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As an IBM customer you deserve blue chip 
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For more information, use the coupon or 
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I O Pleasesend me more information on IBM PCservice. I 



Title 














CIRCLE 158 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


■ BUSINESS FORECASTING 


original. The micro version is no newcom- 
er either; Quantitative Micro Software is 
up to Version 5.0, and the program has 
most of the sophisticated features econo- 
metrics buffs want, including financial 


analysis and simulation. The program was 
written by one author, David Lilien, and so 
it has a nice coherence missing from some 
software packages that were created by 
committee. 


Quantitative Micro Software included a 
gocxi-sized on-screen tutorial in the soft- 
ware. The tutorial runs only in black and 
white, but you can specify colors for the 
actual package. The documentation itself 
is divided into an introductory section, 
some excellent case studies, a command 
reference section, and a group of chapters 
called “narrative description" that explain 
in plain language the features, options, and 
procedural requirements of the major mod- 
ules. It covers the theory in brief as well as 


■ Quantitative Micro 
Software’s microTSP has 
most of the sophisticated 
features econometrics 
buffs want, including 
financial analysis and 
simulation. 


providing the necessary operational infor- 
mation. The manual is printed on excellent 
paper, actually card st(x;k, which is a re- 
freshing contrast to the tissue-thin pages of 
some other manuals. 

microTSP's command structure con- 
sists largely of truncated English words 
combined into strings. Although the log 
created by a microTSP session through its 
Trace command might look a bit like gib- 
berish at first glance, it shouldn’t take you 
very long to get the hang of microTSP's 
vocabulary. 

The most recent version of microTSP's 
data editor allows the estimation of piobit 
and logit models, but this otherwise com- 
plete package does not offer spectral anal- 
ysis as yet. [IS 


Marvin Bryan is vice president of strategic 
plarming and research for one of the na- 
tion's leading advertising agencies and su- 
pervises microcomputer operation in his 
department. He has written many articles 
on computing and is a member of the 
American Statistical Association. 



CIRCLE 171 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC magazine ■ AUGUST 1986 
234 



PC 1 

Your #1 choice. 


We buy the best — you get the best. 


i r i r ;.i r iiii r iiii i .i.i;.ii.iii i ..iii.. m i jv .ii r .ii...i v ii r i i . lr i ; iii.i v i r^ 

“Among the 13 machines tested, the ARC 286 Turbo | 
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Roppy/HaM Disk Drive Controller Card 

Qock/Calendar with Battery Backup 

8 Expansion Slots 

AT Compatible Keyboard 

Runs all major software written for the 

IBMPC, POXTand PC/AT 

Operating Manual 

ARC MS-DOS 3.10 Included 

S Year Manufacturer’s Warranty 


$1795 

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Speical System deal — Only S600* more for I'XtA (half- 
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ARC 286 
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Game Pott 

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IBM 

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Lettertex Moncx:hroine 
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IDM, Hercules, Compaq, ATT, Panasonic, TEAC, NCtsubishi, 
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ADM002 99 
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ADF003 75 

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DSH030 6» 
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Product 

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PCI WholcMle I 
Code Price I 


Tape Backup: 
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PCI’s Policies 

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guaranteed in 15 days or less*. 
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Prices subject to change without 
notice. 

Prices shown are Dealer 
Wholesale Prices. Members pay 
8% above this price, non- 
members, 15%. All orders add 
2% shipping & handling charge. 
Members have 15 day return 
priviledges on all hardware 
purchases. 

All software returns are subject 
to a 20% restocking fee. 

15 dty dcUvcfy does Mlipfty to buck ordered teai^ or 
ordm puid by penoM cteck. 

Torecieve aa RMA autte, piette can (213) 263-3819 
darioi ocaiml btiakiaai hoatt. 


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■ SPECIAL REPORT ■ CHARLES BERMANT AND BARRY OWEN 


The Second Annual PC Magazine Awards for 
TECHNICAL 0 EXCELLENCE 


THE 

ENVELOPE 

PLEASE 


1 "“ n an industry increasingly driven by well-financed efforts to dominate existing 
market niches rather than carve out new ones, where the exigencies of big-buck 
marketing commonly triumph 
over innovation, the editors of PC 
Magazine once again salute the 
few genuine examples of break- 
through design and engineering. 

Of the more than 1 ,000 prod- 
ucts we tested and reviewed last 
year, too many were just tired 
copies of one another. All-too- 
similar modems, memory boards, 

_ printers, database managers, 
and word processors crowded dealers' shelves 
vying for your attention. Very few exhibited the 
flashes of technological insight that can truly 
advance your productivity. And too often these 
advances remained submerged beneath a swol- 
len sea of marketplace hype and hyperbole. 

Last year, to help son out the winners and losers for you and to spotlight the pioneering prod- 
ucts that can make a big difference in the way you work, we created one of the most rigorous 



Nestled in velvet, the prized silver 
medallions awaited announcement of this 
year's winners of the PC Magazine 
Awards for Technical Excellence. 


One evening each year the PC industry’s best and brightest 
gather under a single roof to celebrate the spirit of inventiveness. 
For the second year running, PC Magazine’s Awards for 
Technical Excellence was the hottest ticket in town. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
239 




■ TECHNICAL EXCELLENCE 


testing facilities in the country, as well as 
in the personal computer industry — PC 
Magazine Labs. Early this year, the top 
PC Magazine editors and PC Labs re- 
searchers met to identify the products in- 
troduced in 1985 that they felt demonstrat- 
ed the most significant technological 
leaps. And at Atlanta’s Spring Comdex, to 
a hall packed with over 500 of the indus- 
try’s top movers and shakers, we recog- 
nized this spirit of innovation by present- 
ing the second annual PC Magazine 
Awards for Technical Excellence. 

While the previous year’s awards cere- 
mony and dinner had been held in the ter- 
raced gardens of Atlanta’s elegant Swan 
House, we wanted the 1986 presentation 
to reflect PC Labs’ strict concern for the 
demanding, highly precise analysis that 
has already garnered it industry-wide re- 
spect. As a fitting site, we chose the 
gleaming new showplace lab of the Geor- 
gia Technical Research Institute, one of 
the nation’s leading computer science re- 
search facilities. 

Huge, life-size photographs of the cen- 
tury’s leading scientists at work in their 
own labs decorated the walls, while a 
thicket of bubbling laboratory glassware 
gave the room atmosphere. The guests 
donned long white lab coats adorned by 
the PC Magazine logo, nibbled at a groan- 
ing board of regional delicacies, and 
sipped drinks out of chilled beakers. Later 
in the evening, master of ceremonies Bill 
Machrone presided over the actual awards 
ceremony, handing out the dense silver 
medallions to 20 of the industry’s most de- 
serving innovators. 

Unlike the previous selection, this 
year’s slate of winners favored creative 
hardware design. Last year, five out of six 
awards went to software authors (see “In 
Praise of Unsung Heroes,” PC Magazine, 
Volume 4 Number 16). This year, five out 
of eight awards were for inventive hard- 
ware products. In addition, we conferred a 
now-traditional special award for industry 
service. 

Noteworthy this year was our recogni- 
tion of the contribution made in one specif- 
ic area by two industry giants, IBM and 
Apple. IBM demonstrated that it deserves 
its reputation for engineering just as richly 
as its reputation for marketing. And Ap- 
ple, which had never before introduced a 


product for the IX)S environment, showed 
that it too is capable of dazzling design 
work. However, we also singled out for 
distinction a wide range of far smaller 
companies whose contributions were 
equally worthy. 

Selection of the wirming products and 
the individual innovators responsible for 
these products began right after the first of 
the year, when we mailed out a brochure 
soliciting nominations from the industry. 
Every time PC Magazine editors hit the 
road to address a corporate user group , pay 


■ Apple Computer, which 
had never before 
introduced a product for 
the DOS environment, 
demonstrated that 
it is capable of 
dazzling design work, 

a visit to a product development depart- 
ment, or attend a technical forum, we re- 
minded people that nominations were 
open. Likewise, we spread the word 
among visitors to our editorial offices and 
to the PC Magazine Labs. 

Predictably, some companies and indi- 
viduals tried to stuff the ballot boxes by 
nominating their own products. “That’s 
okay,” noted Bill Machrone, editor of PC 
Magazine. ‘ 'The number of nominations a 
product receives has nothing to do with our 
selection. And besides, sometimes you 
have to blow your own horn. ’ ’ 

When the cutoff day arrived, a commit- 
tee consisting of Machrone, executive edi- 
tors Barry Owen and Paul Somerson, spe- 
cial-projects editor John Dickinson, senior 
editor Bill Howard, and West Coast editor 
Stewart Alsop selected the eight winning 
products and one special award for service 
to the industry. Many of those nominated 
were certainly exciting products, but com- 
pared with the winners just didn’t go far 
enough. Others were enhancements of fa- 


miliar technologies rather than technologi- 
cal breakthroughs. The final selections are 
clearly in a class by themselves, impres- 
sive technical innovations that advance the 
state of the art, 

PLUS HARDCARD Plus Development’s 
Hardcard is no longer the only hard disk 
card on the market, and, in fact, managed 
to hold on to this distinction only briefly. 
Nor is it the least expensive disk on a card. 
But when we reviewed it last fall, it was 
the first of its kind. The fact that there are 
now perhaps a dozen imitators available — 
a number of them impressive, and incre- 
mentally if not breathtakingly innova- 
tive — only confirms the Hardcard’s claim 
to a PC Magazine Award for Technical 
Excellence. 

In our review (see “The Hardcard: A 
10-Meg Marvel,” Volume 4 Number 25), 
we described the Plus Hardcard as “a mir- 
acle of miniaturization ... a complete 
Winchester hard disk-based mass storage 
subsystem on a single expansion card. . . . 
The clever package lets you do things no 
other hard disk can, like keep both floppy 
drives in your PC or double the mass stor- 
age capacity of an XT without an expan- 
sion chassis.” 

Contributing editor Winn L. Rosch was 
particularly impressed by the Hardcard’s 
installation strategy, which replaces the 
commonly used tag-along floppy disk full 
of often-arcane instmctions with a ROM 
chip on the board. Everyday utilities are 
written on the hard disk itself. 

In Atlanta, we recognized Plus’s 
founder and director of technologies and 
strategies, Joel Harrison, an alumnus of 
Hewlett-Packard. Harrison, whose back- 
ground is in mechanical engineering, was 
inspired one day in 1983 when he lifted the 
hood of a new product called the IBM PC- 
XT and realized that there were special op- 
portunities in the expansion slots. The dif- 
ficult development process involved 15 to 
20 people and lasted 2 years. 

Today, when it seems that every pe- 
ripheral manufacturer and mail-order 
house has a hard disk card to call its own, 
the Hardcard from Plus Development 
Corp. is still one of the few that fits com- 
fortably into one expansion slot (most still 
require a slot and a half), even in the re- 
cently introduced 20-megabyte version. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
240 






■ TECHNICAL EXCELLENCE 


APPLE lA^HWRlTER No one these 
days seems to believe much in the inevita- 
bility of a paperless society. Paper is like 
department-store shopping and big-screen 
movies: perennial as the grass. The fact is, 
printers and printer technology are more 
important than ever to productivity in the 
workplace. 

At Comdex, PC Magazine cited two 


annual special printer issue (Volume 3, 
Number 19, November 11). The Apple 
LaserWriter, however, was the first rc- 
compatible printer to implement the Post- 
script Page Description Language from 
Adobe Systems (see Volume 4 Number 
19, page 177). Understanding Postscript’s 
significance is essential to understanding 
why the Laser Writer won a PC 


most office environments. In addition, to 
get the slicker output of an off-site Mer- 
ganthaler, Compugraphic, or other dedi- 
cated typesetter, LaserWriter users can de- 
liver design work directly (via disk or 
modem) without the expensive and time- 
consuming intervention of a typesetting 
professional. According to PC Magazine'^ 
printer expert John Dickinson, ‘ ‘This is a 



This year s winners (for products introduced in 1985) of PC Magazine Awards for Technical Excellence, starting in back row from left to right: John 
Newnun, Jerry Robinson, and Charley Rogers for the IBM Proprinter: Reed Sturtevant of Graphic Communications Inc. for FreelaiKe.' Jim 
Armstrong accepting for the Apple LaserWriter: Christopher Herat of Javelin Scfiware Corp.for Javelin : Edward P. Hutchins aiul Shyam K. 
Igagtruri of Chips and Technologies Inc. for the EGA CHIPSet. Front row. left to right: Rod RoArk of Software Link Inc. for LAULink: LinrlaC. 
Lawrence of Think Technology also accepting for the Apple LaserWriter: Yi-Hsien Hao Chips and Technologies for the EGA CHIPSet: Phil 
O’Donnell accepting for Mike Brown of Central Point Software (CopyJPC). who received a special award for service to the industry: Harry Y oung 
accepting for Plus Development's Hardcard: and Bill Machrane, editor of PC Magazine. Award winners not shown: Joel Harrison of Plus 
Development: Dave Paterson. Bayles Holt, Gursharan Sidhu. and Alan Oppenheimer of Apple Computer: Robert Firmin and Stanley Kugell of 
JaveUnScftwareCorp.: Mike BrawnpfCentral Point Software: and Paul Bdran. BahmanZargham, and General H .R . "Johnny" Johnson of Telebit 
Corp.for the 10,000-bps Trailblazer modem. 


breakthrough printers. Surprisingly, both 
come from companies better known for 
their computers: Apple and IBM. The Ap- 
ple LaserWriter and IBM Proprinter are at 
opposite ends of the performance spec- 
trum. The former is an expensive, high- 
end machine that produces near-typeset- 
ter-quality results. The latter is an 
impressive, American-made (rare in its 
category) breakthrough that pushes dot 
matrix output to a new level of perfor- 
mance and cost effectiveness. 

Laser printers, like hard disk cards, are 
no longer unique; in fact, we expect to 
evaluate nearly a dozen of them in our third 


Magazine Award for Technical Excel- 
lence. 

Postscript offers a powerful way to de- 
scribe how a page is going to look. Many 
typesetting manufacturers have imple- 
mented the language to make the page- 
composition process easier and more flexi- 
ble from a software point of view. With the 
appropriate software on the PC, the Apple 
LaserWriter offers the same powerful 
page-makeup capabilities (although with 
lower print resolution than that of a dedi- 
cated typesetter). PC-based LaserWriter 
users can design and print documents with 
a sophistication never before available in 


fantastic technical achievement.” 

The original intent of the LaserWriter 
was to help expand the market for 
networked Macintoshes. In development, 
however, the design team realized that the 
demand for their product would be bigger 
than the target market. As project director 
Dave Paterson noted. “The original intent 
was to enhance the Macintosh, but that 
we’d sell it to PC users was a secondary 
hope. When we first started showing it to 
people we were amazed at the response; 
one dealer told us he’d sell more of them to 
PC users than to anyone else.” For tJteir 
accomplishment in developing the Apple 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
241 






■ TECHNICAL EXCELLENCE 


LaserWriter, /’CA/ogoz/ne cited Paterson, able, but somehow, year after year, pre- 
Bayles Holt, Gursharan Sidhu, and Alan dominant. 

Oppenheimer. Holt wrote the software. Still, everyone knows that the printer 
while Sidhu and Oppenheimer developed market belongs to the Japanese. Apparent- 
the network applications. ly, someone at IBM didn't get the word. 

That someone is actually three people: 
IBM PROPRIISTER In a decade that Charley Rogers, John Newman, and Jerry 
has witnessed the rise of advanced techni- Robinson, who received Awards for Tech- 
caJ research and highly efficient manufac- nical Excellence for their management 
hiring capability abroad, IBM has main- roles in the design, development, and pro- 
tained and enlarged its international duction of IBM’s winning, made-in- 
markets. It is the Boeing of computer com- America Proprinter. According to John 
panics — neither infallible nor unassail- Dickinson, the IBM Proprinter “is the fust 


THE NOMINEES 


In addition to the nine wiruiers, the fol- 

Microsoft QuickBASIC 

lowing products received nominations 

Microsoft Cknp. 

for a PC Magazine Award for Tedinical 

Mkrostft Windows 

Excellence. 

Microsoft CJorp. 

Mind Reader 

ATI VLSI CGA Array 

Businessoft 

Array Technologies Inc. 

NEC Multisync Monitor 

Automentor 

NEC 

Software Recording Ckxp. 

NetWare 1.02 

Backtrack 

Novell Inc. 

Tallgrass Technologies Cloip. 

NetworkREVELATION 

The Bernoulli Box 

Cosmos Inc. 

Iomega Cknp. 

Noted! 

BetterBASIC 

Turner-Hall 

Summit Software Technology Inc. 

Paradox 

DacEasy 

Ansa Software 

Dac Software Inc. 

Paragon Accounting 

Datran Modem Accelerator 

Pyramid Data Ltd. 

Datran 

PaOiminder 

EnaNel.l 

Westlake Data Corp. 

The Software Group 

PC’s Limited AT 

Framework II 

PC’s Limited 

Ashton-Tate 

PC/T format 

Guru 

Tallgrass Technologies Corp. 

Micro Data Base Systems Inc. 

Qmodem 

IBM/Microsoft NETBIOS 

(Public domain, author 

IBM Corp. , Microsoft Coip. 

John Friel) 

JLASER 

R:base series 5000 

Tall Tree Systems 

Microrim 

Lotus/Intel/Microsoft expanded 

Relay Gold 

memory speciflcation 

VM Personal (Computing Inc. 

Lotus Development Corp., Intel 

Star Micronks printers 

Cknp. , Microsoft Coip. 

Star Mkronics Inc. 

Masterflight 

Tapestry 

Kamerman Labs 

Torus Systems 

Mead Data Demo diskette 

Xerox Model 4045 copier/printer 

Mead Data Ontral 

Xerox Cotp. 


and only low-cost printer to provide acces- 
sible and easy-to-use envelope- and single- 
sheet-feeding in the dot matrix field. 
What’s more, the IBM design team 
achieved this without sacrificing speed, 
features, or output quality — or adding sig- 
nificantly to the cost of the product.” 

As our reviewer noted in last year’s spe- 
cial issue on printers, “I liked IBM’s new 
Proprinter when I fust saw it and guessed it 
had a price tag of about $750. But I fell in 
love with it when I found the price was 
only $549” (see “Printers,” Volume 4 
Number 19, page 1 19). In a product cate- 
gory full of offshore-manufactured looka- 
likes, IBM’s Proprinter is an impressive 
innovation at a reasonable price. 

EGA CHIFSET Measured by the num- 
ber of new products introduced, 1985 was 
the Year of PC Graphics. When the PC 
was fust introduced, the importance of 
graphics on business desktop computers 
was downplayed because PCs were re- 
garded as word and number machines. 
Graphics were for games. Then business 
people discovered that charts, tables, 
graphs, and other presentations could be 
designed and produced on PCs. Small- 
business, corporate, and professional de- 
mand began to grow for better graphics 
programs and hardware capability. 

The most significant technological 
breakthrough last year in the realm of 
graphics hardware was the EGA CHIPSet 
from Chips and Technologies, headquar- 
tered in Milpitas, California. Chips, as the 
company is usually called, saw opportuni- 
ty where others saw closed doors. 

The problem — and the opportunity — 
was the introduction of IBM’s Enhanced 
Graphics Adapter (EGA) in 1984. IBM 
was trying to create a standard in an appli- 
cations field — PC graphics — that lacked 
one. In fact, graphics equipment has been 
one of the most confusing product catego- 
ries in the PC marketplace. Even sophisti- 
cated users are often baffled. By using five 
custom-integrated circuits on its EGA 
board, however, IBM effectively prevent- 
ed other add-on board manufacturers from 
creating their own EGA-compatible prod- 
ucts and enlarging the market — suppress- 
ing the very phenomenon that contributed 
to the huge success of IBM’s line of per- 
sonal computers in the first place. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
242 






It was back in 1986 that we first grasped the full significance of SCO XENIX* 

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■ TECHNICAL EXCELLENCE 



Just in lime, ihe receiving bay of Georgia Tech’s new computer lab was transformed for PC 
Magazine‘5 ' 'Famous Labs of All Time" party at the Spring Comdex in Atlanta . Surrounded by 
blown-up photographs of famous scientists (Madame Curie, Thomas Edison. Louis Pasteur, 
Guglielmo Marconi), early arrivals in white PC Lab coats mingled with the blue-jacketed PC 
Magazine staff. Meanwhile, other guests inspected special e.vhibits in the research labs upstairs. 
By evening ' s end. over 500 industry luminaries crowded the hall to honor this year' s winners of the 
PC Magazine Awards for T echnical Excellence . 


Enter Shyam K. Nagrani and Edward 
P. Hutchins, project engineers, and Yi- 
Hsien Hao. design engineer for the EGA 
CHIPSet at Chips and Technologies. They 
set out to design new chips that not only 
improved on the EGA's speed and perfor- 
mance. but did so at a cost that would al- 
low alternative add-on board manufactur- 
ers to beat IBM's price (see cover story, 
this issue). To do this, they integrated the 
internal logic of IBM's five custom chips 
and 16 other components into four very- 
large-scale integration (VLSI) compo- 
nents that provide 100 percent compatibil- 
ity with the IBM EGA board. For their 
outstanding work they earned a PC Maga- 
zine “Be.st of 1985" citation (see "The 
Best of 1985 (and Some of the Worst)." 
Volume 5 Number 1) and an Award for 
Technical Excellence. Ironically, because 
of its price, size, and performance limita- 
tions. the IBM EGA board was not widely 
accepted as a standard; now that the inno- 
vators at Chips and Technologies have pre- 
vailed. the EGA is becoming a real stan- 
dard — cheaper if not cheap, and plentiful. 

FREELANCE Recognition for achieve- 
ment in technical excellence is not based 
on popularity, although technical excel- 
lence is often rewarded in the marketplace. 
While the number of nominations a prod- 
uct received for the PC Magazine Award 
for Technical Excellence had no bearing 
on the hardware and software selected, the 
product that received the most nomina- 
tions was also one that most deserved an 
award. 

The epigram printed on the pa.stel-col- 
ored. postmodern cover of a Graphic 
Communications Inc. brochure calmly as- 
serts (under a heading that reads “The 
Power of Persuasion"). "Most audiences 
only half-believe their ears. To really con- 
vince them, you need charts and graphs as 
strong and clear as your words. 

Graphic Communications' Freelance 
(acquired by Lotus Development Corp. in 
June), Ihe nomination leader, is a break- 
through product for filling that need. Free- 
lance was cited at the Technical Awards 
dinner for its "giant leap forward in ease of 
use, power, and the completeness of its 
font and picture libraries." The Awards 
committee considered its user interface "a 
clear advance over anything else we'd 


seen." In addition to its presentation 
skills. Freelance complements Lotus's I- 
2-3 by letting users quickly and easily 
modify 1-2-3 graphs. 

Freelance's chief programmer was 
Reed Sturtevant. whose record of early 
achievement (Sturtevant is 29) was already 
apparent when he entered MIT at 16. Slur- 
tevant set out to design a graphics program 
that would appeal to both artisLs and non- 
artists. Practically, this meant that his 
package had to combine sophisticated 
functions — artists are demanding — with 
reasonable accessibility, usually called 
“ease of use." Many graphics products 
fail to do either; some are capable of doing 
only one or the other well, others manage 
both adequately. Freelance shines at both 
ends. Thanks to Reed Sturtevant. it 
achieved technical excellence. 

Javelin Roughly 2 million people cur- 
rently use 1-2-3. This superb program, 
which owns over 80 percent of the spread- 
sheet and financial analysis market, was 
one of those rare applications that actually 


created a demand for personal computers. 
Tens of thousands of companies and indi- 
viduals bought PCs expressly to set up and 
manipulate numbers the 1-2-3 way. 

This fact makes life very difficult for 
anyone thinking of introducing a new 
spreadsheet program. That Javelin, from 
Javelin Software Corp. (located in Lotus's 
hometown, Cambridge, Ma.ssachusetts), 
could attract favorable attention in so un- 
forgiving a market is a tribute to its techni- 
cal excellence. 

Nearly every product offers graphical 
output. Javelin is unique in using graphics 
for input. Draw a curve on the screen, and 
Javelin will pick off the data points and fill 
its table with them. This capability, cou- 
pled with its ability to look at data from up 
to eight different views, its effective ap- 
proach to self-documentation, and its 
overall ease of use, has earned Javelin a 
PC Magazine Award for Technical Excel- 
lence. 

In his "Best of 1985" citation. Bill 
Machrone described Javelin's achieve- 
ment, “Javelin is a database of numeric ta- 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
244 




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operation and superb printing qual- 
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for a limits time, you can get a $50 
rebate on any Quietjet Plus you buy. 

Just visit your Iff dealer for a 
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■ TECHNICAL EXCELLENCE 


bles in which the relationships are defined 
by formulas. Is that good? You bet. Jave- 
lin understands statements such as ‘profits 
= sales — expenses’ without such excess 
baggage as labels, rows, columns, or 
range identifiers. It doesn't even require 

data. You get to check your logic before 
entering a single cell. But Javelin knows 
that you’ll be entering figures in spread- 
sheets called sales and expenses and that it 


will calculate profits from them. . . . Jave- 
lin understands time implicitly.” 

Three cofounders of Javelin Software 
Corp. received medallions. Company 
chairman and CEO Robert Firmin contrib- 
uted his expertise in business and financial 
modeling. Stanley Kugell, 26, is a veteran 
of the famed Xerox Palo Alto Research 
CenterfPARQ, which he joined at age 16. 
Kugell’s strength in user interface design 
was critical to achieving Javelin's unique 
muitiview interface and exceptional ease 
of use. Christopher Herot, vice president, 
engineering, and a computer gr^ics ex- 
pert, led the Javelin design team. 

TRAILBLAZER MODEM Conven- 
tional wisdom holds that the only safe 
thing to do in telecommunications is fol- 


low the standards and try to hack out mar- 
ket share with price and feahires. Telebit’s 
10.000 bit-per-second Trailblazer modem 
flies in the face of convendon by using a 
thoroughly nonstandard technique to han- 
dle data at minimum speeds of 9,600 bps 
over dial-up lines. In practice, it often tuns 
twice as fast. 

The Trailblazer functions like a modem 
but is actually a general-purpose fiont-end 


communications processor for desktop 
computers. It continually adapts to the 
varying quality of a phone line by dividing 
the communications bandwidth into as 
many as 256 subchannels and transmitting 
data over the most efficient ones. In the 
end, the Trailblazer proves that it’s faster 
to send smaller chunks of data over many 
channels than to load all the data onto a sin- 
gle channel. The Trailblazer is the first 
commercial prxxluct to exploit subchaiuiel 
technology. 

The Trailblazer is an OEM (original 
equipment manufacturer) product, mean- 
ing that Telebit manufactures it for sale to 
VARs, or value added resellers, who typi- 
cally add features and sell the product un- 
der their own names. This practice is al- 
most universal in consumer 


merchandising. Sears, for example, 
doesn’t manufacture washing machines, 
but there are plenty of washing machines 
out there with the Sears Kenmore label. 
While you’re not likely to see the Telebit 
logo on any 10,000-bps modems you 
come across at BusinessLand, chadces are 
that whatever the logo, the unit is, in fact, a 
Trailblazer (see “FASTLINK; Communi- 
cating at I0,0(X) bps and Up,” Volume 4 
Number 25). 

General H.R. “Johnny” Johnson 
(USAF, ret.), president and founder of 
Telebit Corp. , directed the Trailblazer de- 
velopment effort. His development team 
included Paul Baran, chairman of the 
board, who has 30 years of data communi- 
cations experience and is credited with in- 
venting packet-switching technology, and 
Bahman Zargham, director of software en- 
gineering. 

LAMiNK Local area networks are the 
PC rage of the mid-eighties. They’re im- 
pressively functional, allowing users to 
pass around files and share expensive de- 
vices like laser printers. They’re also com- 
plex and expensive. Still, they deliver 
great efficiency where implemented ap- 
propriately. The race is on, and dozens of 
companies are out to make bigger and bet- 
ter LANs. 

While everybody else is designing so- 
phisticated. expensive (in the neighbor- 
hood of $l,(X)0 per PC served) systems, 
Rod Roark realized that a whole class of 
user was being ignored in the process. The 
former president of the Atlanta PC Users 
Group and current technical gum of Soft- 
ware Link, also in Atlanta, Roark was the 
first to recognize that not everyone needs 
100 percent of the functionality of a hard- 
ware-based network. He came up with a 
software-based LAN strategy that 
achieves much of the performance at a 
fraction of the price. 

Roark’s prrduct, LANLink, is known as 
a “zero-slot LAN" (see “Zero-Slot 
LANs: A Low-Cost Solution,” Volume 4 
Number 24) because it doesn’t require the 
installation of adapter boards, special ca- 
bles, and complex software essential to 
hardware-based LANs. Instead, LANLink 
fakes the PC's standard RS-232 port into 
running at a decidedly nonstandard 
1 15,000 bits per second. With appropriate 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
246 




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How long has it been since you actually used your 
computer paint program? Have you used it for more than 
a couple of houre? Is It just taking up space on your hard 
disk or stashed aw^ with your other unused diskettes? 
How many times have you read the ” hype'* or watched a 
sBck demo on a new or improved paint program and paid 
good money for It or^y to find that it fei far short of your 
expectations arxl nothing Btt the manufacnaer’s pr om is es? 
At RIX Softworks, Inc we think It's time for a diar^ and 
EGA PAINT* Is our answerl 

You see. those other programs were ortginaly made 
years ago for systems which were far more limited in their 
fuTKtlons and display capacity than today's computers. 
Since thea other paint programs have simply been 
patched to try to keep up with the rapid growth in com- 
puter capabiRties Aba more advancements have been 
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Yes. EGA PAINT b a COMPLETE tooWt for your drawirg 
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possible EGA PAINT* b your arrsweri 

EGA PAINT was created speclAcaliy for users of the 
IBM* Enhanced Graphics Adapter (or compatible). EGA 
PAINT takes fuH advantage of every feature the new EGA 
StarKlard offers In an extremely easy to use format (As a 
nvitter of fact the IHustratlon you see above was aeated 
from a captured Lotus* saeen before the user ever saw 
our manual!) Anyone from 6 to 60 can make dramatic 
high-impact colorful freehand graphics, flow charts, 
graphs, ad layouts, bar or PERT charts, schematics, efo. 
The only limitation b your imaglrMtlon. 


Why b EGA PAINT* so effective for such a widely 
diverse group of users? The answer b simple, we made it 
that wayl We knew vre had to irKkide the features users 
had grown to expect in starxlard paint programs and then 
take a big step forward to make EGA PAINT* easier to use 
ar>d utiize the fuH capabilities of the EGA color adapter. 
We kept you in mirKi when we priced EGA PAINT tool 
With aM the star>dard features we Include, our price b 50 
to 75 percent LESS than the others. 

Here are a few of the StarKlard features all of which are 
kKluded \r\ our specU mtroductoty EGA PAINT pack^ 
EGA PAINT 

Full screen editing with Pop-up Mertus (NO ICONSI): 
Enhanced Brush Control lets you change colors. pMtems, 
widths, shapes arxl do palette mbdng DURING editing 
WITHOUT losing your position: Enhanced Zoom gives 
you 4 to 8 times magnification AND a movable window 
for precise editing: Special Image manipulation lets you 
move. copy, tilt rotate, enlarge or reduce sizes, save or 
load Images anywhere you Ike fUl arKi Pour any area you 
choose vdth any of 64 colors; Save your screens ar>d with 
the Small commarxl in up to 90% LESS dbk space and 
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EGA TEXT 

Choose from over 31 contemporary fonts rartging 
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Capture any screen from just about ar^ other program 
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212/&38-7840 

Advanced Information Systems, Inc. 
1336 Edna S.E. 

Grand Rapids. Ml 49507 
616/243-1312 
Archive Systems, Inc. 

1676 N.W, 2nd Ave. 

Boca Raton, FL 33431 
305/393-4602 
Corporate Micros, Inc. 

333 West 52nd St.. Suite 1204 
New York, NY 10019 
212/315-2853 
Crest Systems, Inc. 

2101 Magnolia Ave.. Suite 206 
Birmingham. AL 35205 
205/326-4882 
Fast Forward, Inc. 

129 Adams Street 
Louisville. KY 40206 
502/589-0301 
ICS Software 
PO.C 359015 
Brooklyn. NY 11235 
718/743-4050 

INACOMP Computer Centers 

700 Remmington Road 

Schaumburg. IL 60195 

312/519-1900 

Micro City Computers 

110 West 3ist Street 

New York. NY 10001 

212/563-6110 

Mitech Corporation 

#1 Perimeter Park South, Suite 335-S 

Birmingham. AL 35243 

205/967-0605 

Modular Management Systems. Inc. 
451 Bloomfield Ave. 

Caldwell. NJ 07006 
201/228-3836 
National Al Lab, Inc. 

1800 Century Blvd.. Suite 770 
Atlanta. 6A 30345 
404/633-3900 

Network Data Systems, Inc. 

3419 Pierson Place 
Flushing. Ml 48433 
313/732-6340 

PRISM Computer & Consulting 
Services, Inc. 

2100 Riverchase Center, Suite 420 

Birmingham. AL 35244 

205/988-5111 

Don SIvitz A Associates 

435 Dayton Street 

Cincinnati. OH 45214 

513/421-1105 

Southeastern Systems, Inc. 

619 East Price Ave.. Suite ii'i2 
Gastonia. NC 26054 
704/866-8048 

TRIMARC Systems, Inc. 

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Rockville. MD 20852 

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THE 

SOFTWARE 
LINK, INC. 


m TECHNICAL EXCELLENCE 


drivers, multiple PCs can share files and 
printers over simple twisted-pair wiring, 
with no additional hardware. The elegant- 
ly simple solution is not the answer for all 
business environments, but in the hereto- 
fore unserved market for smaller, some- 
what less functional, and considerably less 
expensive (and less buggy) local area net- 
works, lANLink is the answer. 

MIKE BROWN (SPECUL AWARD) 

has a consistent vision: users should get the 
full value of the software they pay for. Un- 
fortunately, as most readers know, 


■ In our travels, we’ve 
been meeting with 
the visionaries, who 
have not been idle. Works 
in progress promise 
to be strong contenders 
for critical success. 


Brown's vision runs counterto the sincere- 
ly, but mistakenly, proclaimed interests of 
the many software publishers who use 
copy protection as a bludgeon to protect 
market share. While Brown has been 
threatened with everything but physical vi- 
olence as a result of his stand, it has yet to 
be shown that any company has actually 
been hurt by copying. 

Mike Brown has not only held his own 
in the fierce battle of technologies that en- 
sued. but actually gained ground as a num- 
ber of major software publishers saw the 
light and dropped copy protection. His 
company. Central Point Software, pro- 
duces a line of disk-copying software and 
hardware that permits proper backup and 
the unlocking of applications programs. 
Brown’s program, Copy2PC (see "Work- 
ing Around Copy Protection." PC News, 
Volume 5 Number 10, page 47). facilitates 
the copying of protected programs or their 
easy transferral to a hard disk — both legiti- 
mate needs of most business users of appli- 


cations software. 

In Atlanta PC Magazine saluted Mike 
Brown with a special award for serving as 
a user-aware conscience for our industry. 
We agree fully with his position that satis- 
fied customers don't betray software pub- 
lishers. Indeed, as senior editor Bill How- 
ard has commented, "Locks tend to keep 
only the honest people out." And we ac- 
knowledge his technical achievement: de- 
vising and publishing updates to disk- 
copying software as frequently as 
required, which, up until very recently, 
has been every few weeks. 

NEXT YEAR’S WINNERS We’re just 
over halfway through 1986, but we’re al- 
ready thinking about the next round of 
Awards for Technical Excellence. In our 
frequent travels. PC Magazine's editorial 
staff has been meeting with the innovators 
and visionaries, who have not been idle. 
Just thinking back over the past several 
months, we have seen works in progress 
that promise to be strong contenders for 
critical success. Some of them are creating 
new markets; others are breaking new 
technological ground. 

Because the largest of all PC trade 
shows — Fall Comdex in Las Vegas — oc- 
curs in November, prtxfucts tend to be in- 
troduced late in the year. But even what 
we’ve seen so far could make for an inter- 
esting race. There’s the new generation of 
"smart” monitors, new graphics technol- 
ogies, incredibly fast machines, a three-di- 
mensional business graphics program, and 
more that we can’t even talk about. 

In the midst of all this creativity, the 
business magazines are bemoaning the 
moribund state of the computer industry. 
Of course, IBM isn’t selling as many 
mainframes. The real work is getting done 
on the machine in front of you. And the 
real creativity was long ago diverted to 
personal computers. Some of us dearly 
love big machines, but talented designers 
go where their work can be seen, to where 
it really matters: the desktop. 

When we look back on 1986 from the 
perspective of the Awards for Technical 
Excellence in 1987, we predict that this 
will have been a watershed year. The prog- 
ress that innovators are making in power, 
price, and performance will set new stan- 
dards for personal computing. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1985 
249 




OF COURSE YOU KNOW PLENTY OE 
PEOPLE WHO USE A PC. 



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■ OPERATING SYSTEMS ■ ROBIN RASKIN AND KAARE CHRISTIAN 


XENIX 

SYSTEM V 

A MULTIUSER 
ANSWER 
FOR THE AT? 


A fter more than a decade of chaos 
and competing standards, AT&T 
finally standardized its venerable 
UNIX operating system in January 1983, 
with System V. SantaCniz Operation’s re- 
cent release of Xenix System V means that 
the cunenl version of the multitasking, 
multiuser system is now available for the 
PC family, and that’s good news for busi- 
ness computing. 

Xenix System V is large and multifac- 
eted. Its myriad features include a base op- 
erating system with four shells, a dial-up 
and direct network, and a fiill-screen edi- 
tor. The program development component 
contains Microsoft’s new emerge com- 
piler. The text-processing system contains 
the touted nroff document formatter, 
the t ro f f typesetting formatter, and pro- 
grams to generate tables and math sym- 
bols. (See glossary for definitions of 
UNIX terms.) This Xenix includes the en- 
hancements that made UNIX System V 
particularly well suited to the business en- 
vironment, such as file-locking. 

Although Xenix System V is most re- 


sponsive in the hands of an experienced 
programmer, it can, thanks to careful doc- 
umentation and some comfortable user in- 
terfaces, be tackled by nonptogratianers. 

Xenbt, the most widely adapted version 
of UNIX, is presently installed on more 
than 85 percent of all microcomputers tun- 
ning UNIX and on more than 50 percent of 
all UNIX machines. Microsoft Cotp. orig- 
inated the Xenix operating system, but to- 
day Santa Cruz Operation (SCO) sells it, 
too. The two companies have a “technol- 
ogy exchange agreement”: SCO is the ex- 
clusive vendor of the unbundled Xenix 
package for 8086 and 80286 machines; 
Microsoft handles large corporate deals 
such as the arrangement it recently entered 
into with IBM. 

For programmers, the primary reason 
for choosing System V over other versions 
of UNIX is largely a matter of standardiza- 
tion. AT&T developed the System V In- 
terface Definition (SVID), which specifies 
the hardware-independent interface be- 
tween application and operating system. 
Xenix System V application developers 


SCO has ported 
the current version 
of AT&T s UNIX to 
personal computing. 
On 80286-based 
machines, its 
multitasking and 
multiuser features 
are finally practical 
for a number 
of applications. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
253 


■ XENIX SYSTEM V 


who adhere to SVID functionality require- 
ments can ensure that their applications 
will ran on any System V architecture, not 
just Xenix. This standardization makes 
programs and applications portable to a 
wide class of machines, from PCs to minis 
to huge supercomputers. 

In addition to supporting the well- 
known and powerful set of standard UNIX 
tools, SCO’s Xenix System V creates a dy- 
namic environment for cross-development 
of DOS programs . With Xenix you can de- 
velop, compile, and link C programs for 
MS-DOS environments. Complete DOS 
libraries are integral to Xenix. Xenix can 
also copy files to and from a DOS hard 
disk partition or floppy. Xenix’s multiuser 
capabilities give program developers the 
opportunity to work concurrently on dif- 
ferent parts of the same project. 

Users who want to run applications in 
Xenix also reap some benefits horn Sys- 
tem V. It is the first UNIX system with a 
standard set of tools for file-locking and 
shared memory. It is also mote easily cus- 
tomized for installation than its predeces- 
sors: you can choose the parts of the sys- 
tem that you wish to install and those you 
wish to ignore, and you can easily install or 
uninstall any part of the system at any time 
using a menu. 

Veteran Xenix users will appreciate the 
PC-environment improvements. For ex- 
ample, SCO Xenix System V can detect 
the 8087 or 80287 math coprocessor chip 
and take advantage of it if it is present. 

Two basic groups of users are attracted 
to Xenix: the first is composed of UNIX 
users who want to use Xenix because of 
the low-cost machines it runs on. The other 
comprises DOS users who need Xenix’s 
multitasking and multiuser capabilities. If 
you think of DOS as a one-person kayak, 
then Santa Cruz Operation’s Xenix is a 
cross between a Polynesian war canoe and 
a one-man band. 

A DUAL EVCMLUTHWI Two years ago, 
when Xenix System III (derived from 
UNIX Version 7) was released for the PC- 
XT (see “A UNIX to Be Proud Of,” by 
Kaare Christian, PC Magazine, Volume 3 
Number 10), the system software had 
promise, but its performance was barely 
adequate. Many programs took too long to 
start executing, and the system bogged 


down seriously whenever two people used 
it simultaneously. Xenix System V is 
markedly cleaner dian previous versions. 

Technically, the old Xenix was a mul- 
tiuser system, but the 4.77-MHz PC and 
its almost-as-slow-as-a-floppy hard disk 
were too sluggish to support more than one 
user. That system was a useful UNIX envi- 
ronment, but it didn’t bring true multiuser 
performance to personal computing. 


■ If DOS is a one-man 
kayak, then SCO’s Xenix 
is a cross between a 
Polynesian war canoe and 
a one-man band. 


Both the hardware and the software 
have evolved over the past 2 years. Xenix 
System V is a different beast, and in- 
creased speed and memory allow the 286- 
based members of the PC line to withstand 
the multiuser torture test. The AT’sCPU is 
many times faster than the XT’s, and the 
standard disk in the AT is twice as fast and 
twice as large as the original XT hard disk. 
IBM and others have armounced AT-class 
machines that tun considerably faster than 
the original 6-MHz AT clock speed. 

How many users can a multiuser sys- 
tem support? That depends on what the us- 
ers are doing. If none of the users are very 
active or their applications are not very 
memory or disk-time intensive, then 
Xenix on the AT might support the 16 ter- 
minals that you can hook up to the system. 
A nwre realistic number is in the neighbor- 
hood of five. And if you want to support 
programmers who feed on a massive diet 
of CPU cycles, you shouldn’t put more 
than two on a single AT. 

BASE SYSTEM FEATURES The 

Xenix base system comprises over 200 
utility programs; the handful of examples 
discus^ below indicate the features that 
give Xenix its reputation for power and 
flexibility. Some, such as the uucp utili- 
ty, are UNIX standards; others, such as 


Multiscreen, are available only for the PC. 

Xenix’s Multiscreen feature is a boon 
for those who like to do several things at 
once. A single keystroke switches the con- 
sole screen and keyboard from one log-in 
session to another. It’s as if you have sev- 
eral terminals on your desk, but with only 
one physical screen and keyboard. The ap- 
plications for this feature quickly become 
evident. For example, when preparing a 
table of figures, I used the editor on one 
screen and a desk calculator program on 
another, and I previewed the printer output 
on a third. Switching from one to another 
was trivial: Alt-Fl pulled up the editor 
screen, Alt-F2 brought forth the calcula- 
tor, and Alt-F3 showed me the printer pre- 
view. Each screen switch takes just a frac- 
tion of a second. 

Xenix’s Multiscreen solves several 
problems with most DOS RAM-resident 
utilities. You don’t need to permanently 
set aside memory for a function you may 



il^FACT FILE 

Xenix System V 

The Santa Cniz Operation Inc. 

500 Chestnut St. 

Santa Cruz. CA 95061 
(408)425-7222 

List Price: Operating system. $495: pa>- 
gram development system. $495: text-pro- 
cessing system. $195; complete SCO Xenix 
system. $1,085. (Upgractes to System V fmm 
either IBM Xenix System III or SCX) Xenix 
System III are available.) 

Requires: 384K RAM (at least 5I2K RAM 
for the development system), one double-sid- 
ed di.d( drive. 10-megabyte or more harddisk 
drive (20 megabytes is recemtmended if you 
plan to use (he entire system. Minimal run- 
time system requires 1 .8 megabytes of stor- 
age. complete ba.se system requires 4,5 me- 
gabytes. p>rogram development system 
requires 3.7 megabytes, and lext-proc- 
e.s.sing system requires 1 .5 megabytes). 

In Short: A multitasking, multiuser version 
of UNIX System V. the AT&T standard for 
UNIX systems. Contains a complete .set of 
features and utilities for programmers who 
want to develop software and for users who 
want to run applications. Some features, such 
as file-locking and shared memory, make it 
particularly welt suited for business environ- 
ments. Not c(^y pixTlected but requires an au- 
thorization numbCT to load. 


CIRCLE e24 ON READER SERVICE CARO 






PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
254 



Uptonve 

addmoal 

porlslor 


orMMItMnal 
dumb (nrnimls 


or may not use, there's no danger of mem- 
ory collisions, and any of Xenix’s hun- 
dreds of applications can run on each of the 
eight screens. Xenix’s Multiscreen feature 
makes it easy for a single user to take ad- 
vantage of multitasking. 

UUCP is a system of programs designed 
for automated transfer of files from one 
UNIX system to another, uucp isn’t real- 
ly a complete networking solution; it is de- 
signed to work over relatively slow tele- 
phone connections or over direct serial 
connections between computers. The ad- 
vantage of UUCP is that it allows thou- 
sands of UNIX systems throughout the 
world to contact each other using standard 
UUCP software. Businesses can send in- 
fomation from one branch to another, in- 
dividuals can transfer information between 
UNIX sites, and a personal or departmen- 
tal Xenix system can communicate with a 
larger, company-wide or university-wide 
UNIX system. 

Xenix comes with an easy-to-install 
UUCP system. We set up the software to 
communicate with the time-sharing UNIX 
system that Kaare uses at work, and our 
first attempt to establish a connection 
worked perfectly. This was the easiest and 
best-documented uucp connection that 
we’d ever set up. 

With its Link Kit, Xenix has stream- 
lined the previously tedious system-gener- 
ation process. The Link Kit ^lows you to 
add extra device drivers to your system to 
support third-party hardware such as tape 


Malltttermiiiai I/O Speeds 


; 9.000 

8.000 

7000 

6,000 

5.000 

4.000 


For up to Ovee active termtnato. the 
average bps rata to each tormlnal 
remaine sieadyi A fourti terminai 
deg ra de a the tf a rwniiBalon speed by 
2613 percenL The fenpaci of tie ftit) 
and sMh termkHto ie not ae strong, 
but tw overatt degradation lor a SB* 
lerminst aysism adds ito to a sleep 51 
percent 


1 2 
ftanber ol active terminals 


IBM PC AT 




A Xenix Multiuser System 


A PC AT running Xenix System V supports multitasking, muibuser 
operations arxJ approaches the pow^ of a minicomputer. With one or 
two eight-port serial cards installed, it can act as host to up to 16 
dumb terminals and peripherals such as printers arxj plotters (each 
card can ajpport up to eight devices). The speed of transmission to 
each terminal is. however, adversely affected when more than three 
terminals are active (see inset). 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
255 


■ XENIX SYSTEM V 


backup units. Because the Link Kit is in- 
corporated into the base system, you are 
spared from having to buy the whole 
Xenix program development system to re- 
build the Xenix kernel. You don't have to 
use the Link Kit to support several quad 
and octal (four and eight port) serial boards 
because Xenix already supports up to four. 
Similarly, you don’t need the Link Kit to 
configure printers. 

BRIDGING TWO WORLDS Xenix can 
share a fixed disk with DOS . After the disk 
is formatted, it must be partitioned with 
FDISK. Usually you must run FDISK 
twice: you run the DOS version to set up 
the DOS partition and then the Xenix 


FDISK clone to set up the Xenix partition. 
The machine will boot the active partition. 

FDISK can also change the active parti- 
tion. For example, if you have been using 
Xenix and want to mn CXDS, before you 
shut down Xenix you would tun FDISK 
and make EXDS the active partition. Then 
you’d shut down Xenix normally, and 
when you rebooted, DOS would take over. 
An alternative is to use a floppy to boot to 
DOS and keep the active flxed-disk parti- 
tion set to Xenix. 

Although Xenix doesn’t allow you to 
tun a DOS application directly, it does al- 
low you to access DOS files that are locat- 
ed on a floppy disk or on a DOS partition 
of your hard disk. The major components 


of the DOS access system are dosdir, 
which lists the files in a DOS directory; 
dosca, which copies files back and forth; 
and dosrm, which deletes DOS flies. 
Xenix supports 8- and 9-sector 360K flop- 
pies and 1 .2-megabyte floppies. 

THE SHELL GAME A UNDC shell is its 
user interface. Most versions of UNIX 
come with multiple shells, and you can 
pick the one that best suits your style and 
level of technical knowledge. After you 
log in, the shell of your choice interprets 
your commands. Xenix comes with four 
powerful shells: the regular Bourne shell 
(which is the default), an old standard fa- 
miliar to UNIX users that many find cryp- 
tic and intimidating; the enhanced System 
V Bourne shell, which has a few extra fea- 
tures for writing shell scripts; the Berkeley 
osh (or C shell), which many people pre- 
fer for interactive use because it h^ a his- 
tory mechanism that lets you reenter ptevi- 
ous commands with a minimum of 
keystrokes; and a visual shell, which is a 
UNIX menu system that allows you to 
choose from menus of options and which 
is especially good for setting up an applica- 
tion. 

The variety of shell offerings is another 
mark of Xenix’s flexibility. Using the 
shells for entering commands and creating 
scripts lets you work with multiple Xenix 
tools to create ad-hoc applications. 

PROGRAM DEVELOPMENT In the 

beginning, the UNIX system was con- 
ceived by a few gifted programmers to 
meet their own needs. This latest version 
of Xenix doesn’t abandon its roots; rather, 
it returns to them. Programmers benefit 
from Xenix’s rich array of tools and the 
fine-tuning of many of the older tools. 

The single most important Xenix Sys- 
tem V enhancement is the C compiler. 
Most UNlXes are equipped with a version 
of the famed Portable C Compiler. While 
it is portable, the Portable C Compiler has 
never been strong on performance. Xenix 
is equipped with Microsoft’s acclaimed 
emerge compiler. Most reviews of 
emerge have noted its range of features 
and impressive performance. 

Xenix System V’s emerge C compil- 
er can produce programs executable under 
DOS or under Xenix. Xenix executables 


A XENIX GLOSSARY 


adb: A general debugging command. 

awk: A simple programming language 
that scans files for specified patterns. 

Berkeley enhancements: A set of 
UNIX utilities developed at the Uni- 
versity of California at Berkeley. 

Bourne shell: A shell, or user interface, 
that is a UNIX standard. 

esh (C shell): A shell whose style is rem- 
iniscent of the C programming lan- 
guage part of the Berkeley enhance- 
ments. 

custom: A Xenix utility that allows you 
to selectively install or uninstall the 
major Xenix subsystems. 

dhx: A high-level debugger found on 
Berkeley systems. 

/dev: A directory that lists special device 
files. 

eqn: A mathematics typesetting pro- 
gram. 

kernel: The heart of a UNIX system. 
The shells and utilities request services 
^m the kernel, which can talk to I/O 
^vices, run programs, and manage 
memory. 

Id: The lineage editor, similar to DOS’s 
LINK command. 

lex: A lexical analysis generator. Often 
used with yacc to develop program- 
ming languages. 

lint: A C-program analyzer. 

make: A program that automates the 
compilation of program source files. 


man: A command that displays manual 
pages on the screen. 

mfcdev: A command that initializes a 
harddisk. 

mkuser: A command that adds a user ac- 
count to the system. 

mm & ms: Macros used to control text 
formatting. 

runff: A text-formatting utility fOT stan- 
dard printers. 

pic: A utility that typesets line drawings. 

refer: A utility that manages references 
for text processing. 

SCCS: UNIX Source Code Control Sys- 
tem, utilities for large-scale software 
development. 

sdb: A high-level debugger used on Sys- 
tem V. 

shell: A program that causes other pro- 
grams to be executed on command. 
For example, UNIX shells perform 
the very same task as DOS’s COM- 
MAND.CXIM. 

tU: A utility that formats tables. 

troff: A text-formatting utility for type- 
setters or laser printers. 

uucp: A utility that copies files to and 
from a remote system. 

vi: A visual text editor, part of the Berke- 
ley enhancements. 

yacc: “Yet another compiler-compil- 
er.” A utility that converts context- 
free grammar into tables for parsing 
algorithms. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
256 


A remarkable breakthrough 
for LANs-one that^ easy 
to use: Tapestry 



No matter what local area 

irk hardware you choose— 
ur next choice should be 
Tapestry network operating 
software from Torus Systems. 

Here are 6 reasons why. 

1 IBM chose Tapestry, for Its over- 
seas market, and it quickly became 
the hottest LAN system in Europe. 



This is the friendly screen that caught 
Big Blue's eye. 

2 lfs the world's eosiest-to-use 
networking software - much 
simpler than Novell, 3Com, or IBM 
because Tapestry is managed with 
icons. To use it, you just point to graphic 
symbols: the "in-troy" to get moil, the 
"cobiner to access files, and so on. 

You even use icons to configure the 
system, so almost anyone con set up o 
Tapestry network-ond keep it mnning 
smoothly. 

3 Tapestry is the most complete 
LAN software money con buy. 

The basic system gives you: 

• Advanced electronic moll 
Compose memos with the Torus text 
editor. Send them to any person or 
group on the network, just by pointing 
to names. Track the mail you've sent. 
Get messages instantly. 

• Cost-effective shoring of hord disks, 
printers and modems 
You con have up to 100 Tapestry 
workstotion/sewers and access any 
one ot them by touching the right 
icon. Since oil Tapestry senrers ore 
undedicated, each station is tree for 
business os usual. You don't hove 
to invest in specialized hardware, or 
sacrifice your valuable PCs. 


• Advanced communications 
capabilities 

Need information from the company 
mainframe or on outside sen/ice? Just 
point to the desired Service icon.Torus 
offers a family of network gateways' 
that automatically make the connection 
and speed your infonnation through. 
•And there's more! 

Tapestry also provides central storage 
of all your applications so they too can 
be accessed with icons. Automatic 
tile locking so you con safely run single- 
user applications not originally 
designed for networks. RIe Manager 
icons that let you manipulate files 
without using DOS commands. Ando 
Telephone Manager that places your 
calls and maintains a personal elec- 
tronic rolodex. 



What good is a network if your people 
don't know how to use it? Tapestry's 
screens are so easy to understand, 
anyone con net great results without 
special skills or training. 

4 Tapestry supports all the 
standards, like IBM Token-Ring, 

PC Network and 3Com hardware. Like 
PC-DOS 3.1 and NETBIOS. So you con 
choose the LAN hardware that's best 
for you, and you won't have to wony 
if your software will ran" 

5 Tapestry is proven and reliable. 

Thousands of Tapestry stations 
hove been installed in both large and 
small companies in the U.S. and around 
the world. Customers Include: Proctor 
& Gamble, EDS, the White House, the IRS, 
Prime Computer, TRW, NBC News, Shell 
Oil, Exxon and Citicorp. 


With this coupon you get a 
FREE Network Manager 
AND a maney back guarantee! 

Usually, Tapestry costs $495 
for your firsf workstation (the 
Network Manager) ond S295 for 
each additional stalion.t BUT 
NOW YOU CAN GET ATAPESTRY 
STARTER PACK (BOTH THE 
MANAGER AND THE SECOND 
STATION) FOR ONLY $295! 

And we're so confident youTI 
love Tapestry, we'll let you return 
it - for any reason - Within 30 
days of shipment and we'll gladly 
refund your purchase price 
(less $50.00 restocking fee). 

So send this coupon to us, 
take it to your Torus Dealer, 
or coll in your order today, and 
start networking the easy way. 


n 


Networking htordwoe- 


NufTtber of WoilelQtiofts n Office. 
Subtotal 


$295! 

Add$700shipping/han(inQ S 

Cokfomta residents odd 6 ti%salMtn $ 

($ 19 16 ) 

Mtounl enclosed S 

Payment VISA MC Check 

CredtCordExp Dote > 


Act ne«r; oAer exiNM AMOuet 1 By16M. 

The oner s good only nUS and Conoda 
”r/Ct\r~M lO ^&SeaportOotft,Suiel05 

j 

Sydem nequirements StcRnn 1 BMPClXIATorcampatblB 
3&4K. 10MB harddsk Station 2 BM PC,XlATor compatible 
320K. Plus suitable networtgng hordwon. 

Notes *ASYNC IS standard, wniieVTl00.3270SNA.andRerTyote 
Access rve pijcriased separateV ''Tested oppleanonBlnctude; 
dBcse III l\ts. MUtiMoie Advantage. (DpenSystene/Vxn^^ 
Displ(Tywrtte3,WorcPerfeci MS Word. Utfus t-2-3. AutoCAD 

testation Pock- $1495. 24 Station tal(-S3695 
Torus and Topestry ore regetered tTodemartMaftonis Systems, 
Ud. IrodetTTryki 3Com - 3CtofTi Cora IBH Oisptoywri te 3 0^ 
PC4X)S - IBM Corp. MS Word - Microeott. Inc,' dBose 1 N Plus - 
Ashton-TOte: 1-2-3ondU)tus-Lc*u8DeselopmentCorp. 
WordPerfect - SoteliteSotlwcire mtermtcnal. AutoCAD - 
Autodesk. Inc, MuthMote AOronioge - MuHiMote infematonoL 
NiMl - NcvM . I rc Op«i Systerns Aooounhng - Operr ^Serns Inc. 


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■ XENIX SYSTEM V 


OFF-THE-SHELF SOFTWARE FOR XENIX 

More commercial applications than you might think are available for Xenix, 
including a sophisticated word processor and a 1-2-3 workalike. 

And more are in the pipeline. 


D os users are often bemused by the 
lack of applications software for the 
UNIX environment. It’s as if UNIX pro- 
grammers take a special pleasure in rein- 
venting the wheel each time they need to 
perform a task. Only a handful of appli- 
cations programs are currently available 
for Xenix System V from SCO, but the 
prognosis looks good. Xenix users with 
whom we spoke ate optimistic that with- 
in a year or two the number of good ap- 
plications programs for Xenix will be as 
substantial, if not quite as plentiful, as for 
DOS. Here’s a look at what’s already 
available. 

The SCO's Cyrix Word Processing 
System ($595; tuns on the IBM PC AT, 
AT&T 6300 Plus, and IBM PC and XT) 
is a comprehensive and fully configura- 
ble word processor. If you come ftom a 
UNIX background, you’ll find Cyrix an 
ideal system, combining a handsome and 
intuitive user interface with powerful fea- 
tures. If you come from a DOS back- 
ground, however, you may find the lack 
of context-sensitive help and dynamic 
menus an incredible hindrance. Com- 
pared with DOS word processors, Cyrix 
is about as intuitive as an animal bom in 
captivity. 

Cyrix does have interactive spelling 
and hyphenation, support for all termi- 
nals, and an easy-to-use interface to U- 
NlX/Xenix utilities such as electronic 
mail . In the multitasking , multiuser tradi- 
tion, it offers file-locking, and in the tra- 
dition of most UNlXes, everything about 
Cyrix can be customized, including all 
commands and messages, special char- 
acters and foreign languages, function 
keys, and printers. Cyrix supports 8-bit 
ASCII character sets, which standardize 
it with both the IBM and DEC worlds. Its 
footnotes, table-of-contents generation, 
and automatic numbering make it a pow- 


erful tool for technical writing. 

With SCO Prcfessional ($795; for the 
IBM PC AT and AT&T 6300), the best- 
loved DOS program of all time finally 
finds its way into the UNIX environ- 
ment. Still in a beta-test version and un- 
available for review at this time, the SCO 
Professional is a 1-2-3 workalike for 
Xenix systems. SCO Prcfessional will 
offer full 1-2-3 functionality with a con- 
sistent user interface for spreadsheet, da- 
tabase, and graphics. It can read existing 
1-2-3 files and floppies, but the DOS in- 
formation is regenerated to maintain 
maximum flexibihty. 

According to SCX), SCO Professional 

m DOS users are often 
bemused by UNDC 
programmers, who seem 
to take pleasure in 
reinventing the wheel 
each time they need to 
perform a task. 


contains even more query fields than 7-2- 
3, a larger worksheet, full-preview char- 
acter-graphics support for any standard 
terminal, and a sparse matrix-memory 
manager for optimal spreadsheet storage. 
File-locking protocol is used to prohibit 
multiuser conflicts. 

SCXf’s FoxBASE ($795; for the IBM 
PC AT and AT&T 6300 Plus) is SCO’s 
dBASE II workalike, although beta test- 
ers (it was also not ready for review) tell 


us it has all the features of dBASE III as 
well. It is both language- and file-com- 
patible with DOS’s dBASE 11. iiKluding 
full macro usage. Testers tell us it is 
quick and has twice as many memory 
variables as dBASE 11. Because it is writ- 
ten in C, it is extremely portable, thereby 
maximizing program development ef- 
forts. FoxBASE can tun dBASE II pro- 
grams in multiuser mode without any 
modification. FoxBASE compiles pro- 
gram source code into object code in a 
compact form. It uses virtual storage to 
increase speed, and it uses a B-H tree al- 
gorithm to maintain indexes that require 
less space in memory. 

The Informix Relational Database 
System ($995; IBM PC AT, AT&T 
63(X), PC and XT) contains its own inter- 
active query language and an interactive 
data entry and maintenance program. It 
also itKiudes the Dbstatus database mon- 
itor (including audit and recovery trails), 
a data-description language compiler for 
creating and modifying the database, the 
Ace report-writing, language, the Per- 
form data entry and screen-oriented 
transaction processor, and a language li- 
brary that allows C programs to access 
the database. Irformix uses Xenix’s file- 
locking protocol. For large systems de- 
velopment, Informix is highly respected. 

Other Xenix applications include 
Multiplan Electronic Spreadsheet 
($495), C-ISAM ($325), Compact Level 
n COBOL ($995), COBOL Run-Time 
System ($195), Microsoft BASIC 
($395), Microsoft FORTRTkN ($495), 
Microsoft Pascal ($495), SCO VniPATH 
SNA-3270 (single user, five session, 
$595; multiuser, eight session, $995; 
multiuser, more than eight session, 
$1,995; SNA Programmatic Interface, 
$595). 

— Robin Raskin and Kaare Christian 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
258 





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■ XENIX SYSTEM V 


can be produced for System V or for Xenix 
m. Several styles of floating-point calcu- 
lation and four memory models ak sup- 
ported, and the compiler can generate code 
for the 8086 as well as enhanced code that 
utilizes the extra instructions of the 80186 
or the 80286. That’s a host of features not 
found elsewhere. 

Other major ingredients of the program 
development system are make, sees, 
yacc, lex, ^ lint. The system in- 
cludes the standard ptoftler for mning your 
software, two programs for generating 
cross-reference listings, and a program to 
produce program-flow graphs. Unlike the 
Portable C Compiler, emerge can pro- 
duce C program listings. 

emerge is undeniably a beaut, but 
several ingredients are missing. SCO has 
included db, the primitive machine-level 
debugger, but omitted both of the . more 
powerful, higher-level UNIX debuggers. 
System V’s sdb and Berkeley’s dbx. In 
most UNIX software development envi- 
ronments, it is possible to splice a few lines 
of assembly language into a C program, 
and it is possible to edit and then assemble 
the assembly language output of the C 
compiler. Both of these oft-used capabili- 
ties are missing from emerge. 

But the worst omission concerns the 
DOS development environment. The 
manual contains a l-inch-thick description 
of the Xenix subroutines, but it doesn’t ad- 
equately discuss the DOS subroudnes. It 
includes a list of the common subroutines, 
a list of “differences” for the common 
subroutines, and a list of the DOS-specific 
subroutines, but the DOS-specific routines 
aren’t described anywhere. Your only op- 
tion, if you want to do E>OS development 
in a Xenix environment, is to buy the EXDS 
version of cme r ge . 

FORTRAN is a part of most UNIX sys- 
tems, but SCO charges $495 extra for it. 
Berkeley UNIX systems include Pascal 
and LISP, but LISP isn’t commercially 
available for Xenix, and Pascal costs $493 
extra. (Xenix FORTRAN and Pascal are 
available only on the AT.) Microsoft CO- 
BOL is also available for Xenix. 

TEXT PROCESSING When UNIX was 
developed at Bell Labs, its first application 
was in the Bell Labs Patent Office. Per- 
haps this explains UNIX’s unprecedented 


attention to text processing. 

UNIX and Xenix text processing is full 
featured — but with a definite program- 
mer’s bent. The Xenix System V text- 
processing system’s features include 
n r o f f for formatting documents on stan- 
dard printers, t ro f f for generating type- 
set output, tbl for managing tabular ma- 
terial, and eqn for managing equations. 
Two other handy programs — refer, for 
managing references, and pic, for type- 
setting line drawings — are not supplied. 

■ One of the major 
applications for Xenix 
machines is to run just 
text-editing programs. 

The supplied version of trof f is the 
original, not the newer (and much better) 
terminal-independent trof f. Xenix, like 
AT&T System V, has settled on the mm 
formatting macros. Unlike a true System 
V, it also supplies the popular ms macros, 
although they are not even mentioned in 
the documentation and are presumably un- 
supported. (The vi text editor is supplied 
with the base system.) 

One surprising member of the text- 
processing team is man, the UNIX pro- 
gram that displays manual pages on the 
screen. However, even though man itself 
is present, none of the manual pages are 
supplied on disk, so there is nothing for 
man to display on the screen. SCO is 
aware of the lack, but because the missing 
pages require a lot of disk space, it has no 
immediate plans to supply them. 

UNIX’s word processing programs are 
exuemely powerftil, but they lack the ease 
of use that most PC users take for granted, 
such as context-sensitive help, dynamic 
menus, and bit-mapped graphics. The 
UNIX text-processing tools have proven 
themselves over years of service produc- 
ing technical documents, but there are 
thousands of better systems for writing a 
letter. 

One of the major applications for Xenix 
machines is to run just text-editing pro- 


grams. Many academic and industrial re- 
search groups have enormous investments 
in these tools. A multiuser Xenix system is 
one of the most cost-effective ways to pro- 
duce technical manuscripts, especially if 
you have already learned the system. 

You can have the best text-processing 
tools in the world, but if producing hard 
copy is a nuisance, you’re in trouble. This 
is the sad but true story of Xenix printer 
support. If you want to use any printer 
manufactured in the last decade, you had 
better get out the manual and look up its 
control codes. Even worse, you need to 
purchase the software development system 
if you want to add custom printer support 
to Xenix. 

Everyday printers such as the Epson 
MX-80 or the Okidata 92 ate considered 
special cases that SCO doesn’t support. 
SCO does support the DASl 3(X) and 450, 
the HP 2631, the Teletype Model 37, and 
the GE Terminet 300. Are any of these 
even manufactured anymore? A similar 
list of supported printers is found in my 
1977 Version 7 UNIX manual. Printers 
have evolved a great deal in the past 10 
years, and SCO is playing Rip Van Win- 
kle. Seriously, how many PC AT systems 
ate hooked up to a Teletype Model 37? 

In the minicomputer world, the UNIX 
system has nicely adapted to the emer- 
gence of powerful laser printers. Virtually 
every laser printer ever made is supported 
under UNIX, making it easy to produce 
near-typeset quality economically. How- 
ever, when we asked the SCO support peo- 
ple how to get laser printer support for 
Xenix, their response made us wonder if 
they had ever used a laser printer. They 
then restated their claim that SCO supports 
all printers using a parallel or serial port. 

SYSTEM ADMINISTRATION Xenix 
is mote difficult to manage than DOS, but 
it rewards you for your extra work with 
many additional capabilities. One of the 
traditional criticisms of UNIX is that run- 
ning it is mote like leading a cult than man- 
aging a computer. If you travel in the right 
circles, UNIX system-administration 
knowledge is available, but if you’re out- 
side the clique, then it’s too bad. 

Xenix System V rectifies many of the 
traditional UNIX system-administration 
headaches. For instance, adding accounts 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
260 




■ XENIX SYSTEM V 


SYSTEM V: A XENIX FOR BUSINESS 

System V has made Xenix and UNIX more practical for business, 
as these case histories of corporate users show. 


I f the word UNIX makes you think of a 
university computer center full of 
hackers, it's time to change your think- 
ing. With their System V releases, both 
UNIX and Xenix are moving into the 
business world in a big way. Here are just 
a few of the companies that have incor- 
porated Xenix into their day-to-day oper- 
ations. 

XENIX SIZZLES ‘ 'We looked at a va- 
riety of operating systems, and in the fi- 
nal analysis I’d have to say it’s the rich 
set of tools available for Xenix and its re- 
semblance to MS-DOS that made the 
choice for us,” says Richard Kimsey, 
system manager for Sizzler/Minute-Lube 
Corp. 

"The Salt Lake City-based corporate 
headquarters of Sizzler/Minute-Lube 
franchises is a longtime user of Xenix; in 
time, the entire chain of 36 Sizzler res- 
taurants in four states may migrate from 
DOS to Xenix. Currently the restaurants 
run dBASE I I software on the AT&T 
6300. To accommodate the switch, Siz- 
zler is beta-testing FoxBASE, SCO’s 
dBASE II workalike, and so far the com- 
pany is enjoying 100 percent success in 
porting its files to the Xenix environ- 
ment, 

Kimsey and the staff developed a 
Xenix-based restaurant manager pro- 
gram to handle procedures including data 
entry for payroll, cash receipts, sales, 
and inventory control. The group’s latest 
activity involves implementing an elec- 
tronic file transfer to the main sites. 
“With DOS you need some program 
running all by itself at night with scripts, 
and you have the potential for a messed- 
up modem. A better choice for us is 
uucp. Under Xenix, uucp is especially 
easy to set up and very full featured,” 
says Kimsey. 

At Sizzler headquarters, two AT&T 
6300 Pluses mn SCO System V. These 


two- and three-user systems use the Con- 
trol Systems Hostess Card to support 
their terminals. Text editing and elec- 
tronic mail are the backbone of day-to- 
day applications. The group finds SCO’s 
version of the vi text editor rich in fea- 
tures, and for general word processing 
needs they use SCO’s Lyrix. “Coming 
from a bit-mapped DOS environment to 
Lyrix, the transition is initially difficult,” 
comments Kimsey, "but after working 
with it, I prefer embedded control 
codes.” 

DESIGNING PERIPHEItALS Com- 
putone Systems of Atlanta uses SCO’s 
Xenix System V for its operations and 
also markets unique and imaginative 
hardware peripherals and software for 
the Xenix market. Computone’s most 
popular product, the ATvantage-X, is a 
Xenix multiport expansion card that links 
eight serial ports (up to 16 users) for ter- 
minals. printers, and other devices to a 
PC AT. 

Other Computone products include 
Xenix software drivers, a 60-megabyte 
streaming tape backup unit, a malleable 
RAMdisk product, and The Office AT- 
vantage, an office utility software pack- 
age that includes an appointment sched- 
uler, calendar, electronic Rolodex, 
memo writer, and other office-manage- 
ment tools. 

The Xenix group at Computone relies 
on The Office ATvantage to manage its 
day-to-day activities, and group mem- 
bers do a considerable amount of mes- 
sage passing. The typical in-house con- 
figuration supports seven or eight users 
per system with an AT host. 

Computone’s Xenix products are de- 
veloped almost exclusively on Xenix 
machines. The Office ATvantage soft- 
ware, drivers for the hardware products, 
and all on-board firmware were devel- 
oped using IBM’s System III and SCO’s 


Xenix System V. The programming 
team uses V i , SCO’s /n/brmir SQL data- 
base manager, Lyrix, and both C and as- 
sembly language programming for 
Xenix software development and internal 
documentation. 

Computone still relies on DOS for 
hardware development, and the compa- 
ny uses DOS-based CAD packages, al- 
though the Xenix group is interested in 
exploring the PC-RT’s potential as a 
CAD system machine. 

TRACKING THE FLEET “We see 

Xenix as a good choice for micro-based 
multitasking, multiuser applications de- 
velopment,” says Larry Askew of GTE 
Corp. GTE Data Services, a wholly 
owned subsidiary of GTE Corp., used 
Xenix to develop FleeTracker, its verti- 
cal-market fleet management program. 
The system does inventory maintenance, 
operating-cost management, perfor- 
mance analysis, and maintenance track- 
ing for vehicles in a transportation fleet. 
One primary use of the system is to track 
and schedule preventative maintenance 
for each vehicle. 

Running on a PC AT, FleeTracker is 
a low-cost, multiuser system that gener- 
ally supports four terminals. In a typical 
configuration, each garage supervisor or 
parts person might have a terminal run- 
ning the system. 

Based on Informix SQL, FleeTracker 
takes advantage of Informix's excellent 
query capabilities. GTE developed addi- 
tional database reports using C. The sys- 
tem’s multiuser and multitasking capa- 
bilities are put to work when users 
simultaneously enter data, generate re- 
ports, and query the database. 

(The FleeTracker system is available 
commercially from GTE Data Services, 
P.O, Box 1548, Tampa, FL 33601 (8(X)) 
237^243; in Florida (800) 282-6940.) 
— Robin Raskin and Kaare Christian 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
261 





Uo one’s ever had 
But then no one’s ever 


(4 We typed in at 
a prompt: ‘Who works 
in administration?' 
‘List the totai saiaries 
for the saies 
department.’ 

bandied these 
questions without 
further prompting. 99 

“O&A" comprises menu-driven, 
integrated word processing and data- 
base functions... and adds to that 
a smart query language that gets even 
smarter as time passes. That’s pretty 
special!’ 

“At the heart of the Q&A system 
is the Intelligent Assistant.* Q&A is 
delivered with a 400-word vocabulary 
and a utility that enables you to 
‘teach’ the Intelligent Assistant all 
about a given database!’ 

“Once you describe your data- 
base to the Intelligent Assistant, it’s 
ready to go to work for you!’ 

“First O&A parses a request 
and attempts to understand it based 
on its own vocabulary and its past 
experience. If it can’t understand a 
word or phrase, it asks for more 
information from you until both sys- 
tem and you agree that the intent is 
clear. After it delivers the requested 
report, it remembers the discussion so 
that the next time similar phrasing 
and vocabulary are used, it wiU not 
have to ask for clarification!’ 

“Is Q&A smart enough to stand 
in for the microsystems specialist on 
the weekends? Can the untrained 
boss actually sit down and have a 
meaningful discussion with his data- 
base management software? Our 
experiments certainly support 
that view.’’ 

“For the 80% of data management 
tasks that can survive in the world 
of flat files, Q&A seems to provide a 
uniquely functional answer. Its 
designers have done well!’ 

—Richard Aarons 
PC Magazine, March 19, 1986 


44BlendsSoft^^^re 
Publishing’s ease-of-use 
methodology with 
features more 
common to heavyweight 
data managers. 99 

“Intended for those who want 
ease of use without sacrificing versa- 
tility, Q&A has the look and feel of 
the pfe: products but is easier to user 

“pfc veterans can be up and 
running in short order with Q&A’s 
single-file data manager. Further 
examination, however, reveals flexi- 
bility more akin to data management 
heavyweights dBASE III or R:base 
500or 

“Q&A. . .benefits greatly from 
a natural language interlace. That 
interface, called the Intelligent 
Assistant, is an artificial intelligence- 
based front end that enables you to 
issue commands to the data manager 
in plain English phrasesr 

“The Assistant’s real strength 
is the ease with which it lets you ask 
complex questions like Show the 
electrical engineers with a salary 
between the average and maxi- 
mum. The Assistant will gather 
data on the salaries of all the elec- 
trical engineers in the database, figure 
the average and the maximum, and 
report the results. You get three 
separate functions horn one query, 
and you don’t need to program the 
database for the mathematical 
calculationsr 

“Symantec also had the foresight 
to include a host of conveniences 
usually found only in more ambitious 
programs; a keyb^d macro focility 
for storing and recalling frequently 
typed commands or phrases, plus 
utilities for importing and exporting 
data and copying, renaming, and 
deleting filesr 

—Jim Held 
PC World, April, 1986 



“O&A smoothly integrates a word 
processor, file manager, and report 
generator to form a productive, even fun, 
business application tool. Its Intelligent 
Assistant feature uses artificial intel- 
ligence technolw to dramatically 
reduce the learning overhead. Useful, 
reasonably priced, well-made, not copy- 
protected. Q&A is recommended" 

"The word processor and data 
manager are Q&A's two primary modules. 
Each of these applications Is suffi- 
ciently powerful to compete by Itself 
with popular word processors and data 
managers" 

“Although O&A’s word processor 
is a stand-alone application, it is also an 
integral part of the data manager. . . 
Moving from one to the other is only a 
matter of a few keystrokes" 

"One of the slickest features of 
the word processor is the print envelope 
command. If you type a letter, you do 
not have to type the address a second 
time in another file to print the address on 
an envelope. O&A reads the letter, finds 
the address, then spaces the address 
properly for a business-size envelope" 
“Form generation Is a breeze. . . 

You can draw boxes, center lines and set 
tabs. . .And you can create custom 
help screens for every field, which can be 
important in an environment where 
several people may be using a database." 

-Keith Thompson 
InfoWorld, January 13,1986 


reviews like these. 
hM a database like this. 


seems to me 
the quintessential 
manager’s product.?? 

“A near perfect tool for people 
who want to use their PCs to poke 
around in customer lists, personnel 
lists, product lists, and who also 
need to write reports and letters, all 
in the interest of doing their jobs 
better and more easily. 

“In fact, couple Q&A with a 
power spreadsheet like 1-2-37 and 
a sophistiated organizer and to-do- 
list keeper likeThinkiknk or Ready!, 
and you’ve got very nearly the id^ 
manager's software kit!' 

“An essential element of a 
good manager’s software is that the 
person who’s going to use it doesn’t 
need to know much about it” 

“Say I’m a broker in a securi- 
ties firm. I want to have access to 
lists of my customers, salespeople, 
current buy-sell recommendations. 
I’ll want customers’ buying histories 
and performance figures for the 
salespeople. And that information 
needs to be updated frequently, 
possibly daily. 

“But what I don’t want to do is 
spend a few days setting up those 
databases. 

“What I want is to sit down at 
the computer for a few minutes, set 
up some input screens, then hand 
the inputting job to an assistant. 

“Managers of the world, I give 
you Q&A” 

“When you reach into Q&A’s 
‘Inteliigent Assistant’ you see why 
Q&A’s such a hot tool for managers. 

“The Intelligent Assistant 
query mode lets you use some very 
sloppy phraseology to get back very 
useful information. Ybu’ll need to 
define your more casual terms once, 
but thereafter, specifying search 
criteria is ridiculously easy.” 

—Jim Seymour 
PC Week, January 21, 1986 


44Q&As database and 
word processor add 
features without giving up 
ease-of-use.?? 

“O&A includes among its 
many attractions not oniy the 
file manager and a report 
generator to extract 
information from those 
flies and print it out as 
desired, but a quite use- 
ful word processor inte- 
grated into the package as weli. 

“The word processing seg- 
ment of the software can, in fact, be 
used by itself. . . All of these fea- 
tures take the ‘what you see on the 
screen is what you get on paper’ 
forrar 

“Information from Q&A 
files can easily be merged into 
documents produced by the word 
processing segment of the pro- 
gram. Consider, for instance, the 
ubiquitous form letter. All that is 
needed to generate the individually 
addressed copies of such a letter is 
to insert an asterisk as a marker on 
either side of the field name cor- 
responding to an entry in the 
database. 

“for example, entering ‘Dear 
•title* ‘last name*’ at the beginning 
of the letter would result in the 
automatic salutations ‘Dear Miss 
Willard’, ‘Dear Mr. Lewis’, and so on 
throughout the whole gamut of 
individuals chosen to receive the 
letterr 

—Erik Sandberg-Diment 
The New York Times, March 9, 1986 



44Highest comparative 
rating ever.?? 

"Q8A, the new file management and 
word processing pmgtam has earned the 
highest comparative lating ever awarded 
by Software Digest!' 

"QflA's superior user Inter- 
face and extraordinary 
number of features rocketed 
the program to Its record- 
breaking score, proving 
that a program an be 
both easy and powerful!' 
"Manual is easy to under- 
stand, well organized, with 

excellent examples!' 

"Excellent explanation of program 
commands and funcUons!' 

"Easy to enter/modify data in a record!' 

"Easy to change an existing file's 
record structure!' 

"Easy to search for a record using 
single criterion or multiple criteria!' 

"Easy to merge databases!' 

-Software Digest, February, 1986 

*Q&A is a database integrated with a report 
generator, word processor and spelling 
checker Its natiu^ language interface, the 
Intelbgent Assistant, lets you run the database 
by typing in instructions and requests in 
r^ Englisji sentences. Q&A runs on all IBM 
PCs and compatibles with 5I2K or more 
of RAM and dual floppies or a hard disk. 

For complete product infonnation and the 
dealer nearest you, call 1-800-441-7234. 

(In C» 1-800-626-8847). 

Q&A B a trademdrkoi Symantec CorporattOR 1-2-3 
B a trademark of Lotus Developinent Corporation 


THE INTELLIGENT 
DATABASE 



■ XENIX SYSTEM V 


for new UNIX users has traditionally been 
a manual, error-prone process. Xenix in- 
cludes a program called mkuser that ef- 
fortlessly adds or removes a user account. 
Thoughtful Xenix even mails a greeting to 
new users to make them feel at home. Sys- 
tem administrators can change the defaults 
to customize mkuser’s operation if they 
want to set up accounts in a different way. 
Many aspects of the Xenix system-admin- 
istration programs work like that: the de- 
fault operation is reasonable, but you can 
permanently customize the programs by 
configuring a few text files. 

Xenix’s best system-administration en- 
hancement is the custom utility, a pro- 
gram that allows you to selectively install 
or uninstall the major Xenix subsystems. 
For example, if you don’t want the games 
that come with Xenix System V on-line, 
simply run custom, select the games 
subsystem from a menu, and ask custom 
to uninstall them. You can save disk space 
by tailoring the system to meet your ne^. 

One system-administration area with 
which we had some difficulty was config- 
uring Xenix for a second hani disk drive. 
A convenient program called mkdev lets 
you initialize a second hard disk; it parti- 
tions the disk, scans it for bad blocks, and 
then creates the special device files that al- 
low Xenix to access the hard disk, all auto- 
matically. The only problem is that the 
program and manuals don’t mention the 
name that Xenix assigns to the second hard 
drive, and that name is a vital ingredient 
for the next half of the process. We had to 
figure out the name by carefully scrutiniz- 
ing the files in the /dev directory. 

Another system-administration trap lies 
in wait for the unseasoned user configuring 
Xenix to work with additional terminals. A 
system configuration file called 
/etc/ttytype details the type of ter- 
minal attached to each serial port on the 
machine. But there are two sets of names 
for Xenix serial ports, one set to maintain 
compatibility with previous versions of 
Xenix and one to reflect the capabilities of 
the new system. The old names are in the 
/etc/ttytype file, but the standard 
utilities only work if the file is changed to 
reflect the new names. This sort of trouble- 
shooting is a snap for a UNIX veteran, but 
a fust-time user will be on the phone to 
SCO immediately. 


Despite these miscellaneous shortcom- 
ings, Xenix System V is an easy system to 
administer. The most common procedures 
are well documented in the 100-page Op- 
erations Guide, and extra utilities have 
been added to the UNIX repertoire that 
ease system administration. 

DOCUMENTS AND SUPPORT Xe- 
nix’s documentation is 3,000 pages long 
and 24 inches thick. It is a document in 
which the section describing the document 
itself is 70 pages long. 


■ Despite miscellaneous 
shortcomings, Xenix 
System V is an easy 
system to administer. 


Xenix’s 3,000 pages were, like Rome, 
not built in a day. Some of those pages 
were first written for UNIX, 10 years ago, 
before SCO or Xenix were even a gleam in 
a capitalist’s eye. Other pages are so fresh 
they contain those egregious typos and ob- 
vious blunders you associate with docu- 
ments on which the ink wasn’t dry when 
the shrink-wrap was applied. 

Overall, SCO has made an admirable 
attempt to su|^lement the notoriously pro- 
grammer-level UNIX documentation with 
user-level manuals that describe the major 
subsystems. Some of these user-level 
guides are standard documents from vari- 
ous sources in the UNIX community, 
while others have been created by SCO es- 
pecially for Xenix. The overall quality of 
the manuals is very high, and SCO has 
made a valiant effort to tell you where to 
find various bits and pieces of information. 

Still, finding a particular piece of infor- 
mation in this sea of manuals can be fhis- 
trating. Some of the lettering on the spines 
of the manuals is horizontal and some is 
vertical, making it hard to locate a particu- 
lar volume. You can get dizzy from squint- 
ing and tilting your head each time you 
reach for a volume. Following the cross- 
references is like participating in a treasure 
hunt. One reference sent us to the Serial 


Measuring 
Xenix System V 
Against the 
UNIX Standard 

T his series of performance tests for 
UNIX systems was developed by 
Dan Ts’o, a neurobiologist at The 
Rockefeller University and a long- 
time UNIX aficionado. Parts of the 
tests are adapted from traditional 
UNIX programs developed at Bell 
Labs during UNIX’s formative years. 

The traditional PC Magazine Labs 
benchmark tests emphasize hardware 
performance because PC-DOS, de- 
spite the different versions available, 
is a constant. But in the UNIX mar- 
ketplace, there are more variables. 
Versions are written independently 
and compiled by different compilers, 
and UNIX vendors perform varying 
amounts of software optimization. 

The Ts’o benchma^ tests measure 
both the hardware and software per- 
formance of a UNIX system for ten 
standard tasks. They evaluate three 
aspects of system performance: com- 
putational, floating-point, and system 
tasks that mix I/O and computation. 
The tests summarize all the variance, 
producing a bottom-line appraisal that 
disregards whether performance was 
attained through fast hardware or 
highly tuned software. 

The standard machine used for 
comparison in UNIX system bench- 
mark tests is the Digital Equipment 
Corp. VAX 1 1/780 super minicom- 
puter running the Berkeley 4.2 Ver- 
sion of UND<. 

The test results presented here 
show the processing time (in seconds) 
and graph the AT’s performance rela- 
tive to a VAX 780. A relative speed of 
0.5, for example, means the AT is 
half as fast as a VAX. We ran the 
benchmark tests at the standard 6- 
MHz AT speed and at 10 MHz — 
Robin Raskin and Kaare Christian 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
264 




Xenix Performance Test Results 


liik 

COMPUTATIONAL TASKS 

Tbe Loop, the Sieve and Ge^ are computation- 
intensive tests. The Loop is simply an empty re- 
peating loop: the Sieve of Eratosthenes counts the 
rHimber of prime numbers: and Getpid asks the 
UNIX kernel for its Process ID number 100,000 
tintes. which indicates the speed of the interface SI6V6 

between Xenix and the applications program. 


Getpid 



I I BSD 4.2 on a VAX 11/780 
I I Xenix 5 on a PC AT (SMHz) 
Tlmea in aeconds Ratio* i I Xenix 5 on a PC AT (lOHHz) 


2.5 

11.3 

‘ ' V ' ' 

0.22 1 

' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 

' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 

6.3 

0.4 1 


0 O.S 1 

0 IS 

2.4 

4.1 

--ll ' I ' 1 ‘ I ‘ 

0.58 1 

' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 

2.2 

1.1 1 


0 0.6 1 

0 1 .S 

18.6 

26.0 

' ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ 1 ' 1 ' 

0.71 

' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 

15.1 

1.2 1 


0 


0.5 


to 


IS 


FLOATING-POINT TASKS 

The fl 08 tin 9 <pojnt test, measurino the speed of 
floabrtg-point arithmetic, was perbrmed once at 
each s p ee d with an 60287 math coprocessor chip 
(which performs flo^rtp-point calcuiatiorTs in the 
hardware) installed and once at each speed with- 
out the chip. Wthout this math chip the is no 

match for a VAX, but with the chip Its performance 
Is respectable. 



0 os to ^ 


SYSTEM TASKS 

Tbeee taels reflect a mixture of CPU demands and 
disk demands. As a rule, disk performance is 
more Important to UNIX applications than to 0^ 
appucabona. The 00 test measures the time It 
takas to compile a short program. The grop test 
measures the time It takes for an application to 
search through a 20()K-byte data file. The oopy 
test measures how long it takes to make a com of 
a 200K-byte file; it is the most depertdent on disk 
speed and least dependartt upon CPU speed. The 
nroff tests ntaesure how long it takes to start up 
the standard UNIX text formelter. (According to 
Dan Ts'o. the nroff tests are often a very g^ 
indicator of overall UNIX system perforrnance.) 


CC 


grep 


4.4 


4.1 


copy 

2.0 

nrotf/MS 


4.1 


26.0 

->-^l 'Ml' 

0.17 1 

' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 

' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 1 ' 

15.6 

0.28 1 


0 0 

s 1.0 1.S 

12.8 

*1' 1 ■ 

0.32 1 

, 1 , 1 - 1 . 1 . 

. 1 . 1 . 1 . 1 . 

8.1 

0.51 



0 O.S 1.0 IS 

10.1 

» » ' ■ M ' 1 ' 

0.19 

. 1 . 1 1 1 . 1 1 

■ 1 ■ 1 ' 1 ■ 1 ' 

8.5 

023 1 


0 0 

1 1 1 1 L i— L ' 1 1 — 1 

5 t 

1 1 1 ' 1 I 1 1 1 1 1 

0 IS 

1 1 1 1 — 


13.2 


9.1 


0.31 


0.45 


14.3 


16.4 

0.87 l' 

' I I I ' I ' 

11.3 

1.30 I 


sort 


37.8 


67.0 


40.7 


0.56 


I ' I ' I ' I' 


0.92 


I ' I ' I ' I 


* ratio equals BSO/Xenix 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
265 



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PUBLIC 

DOMAIN 

SOFTWARE 

Newsletter 

Keep up with all of the 
latest free and low cost 
software avaHable from 
bulletin boards and user 
groups . 

Each month get reviews , 
analysis and listings of 
the best programs 
avaUabie and how to get 
them. 

Send $12 for a one-year 
subscription or $1 for a 
sample Issue to the 

Publie (Software) Lfcrary 
P.O. Box 61565 
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a XENIX SYSTEM V 

manual page in the user’s reference, but 
that page was blank except for a note di- 
recting us to the Serial manual page in the 
hardware section, which, we soon discov- 
ered, is located in the Run-Time Environ- 
ment Manual. You’ll need a big desktop to 
manage these manuals. 

One of the problems with the documen- 
tation is due to the fragmentation of the 
software into three separate packages: the 
base system, the text-processing system, 
and the software development system. 
The awk program, for example, is part of 
the base system, and its manual page 
comes with the base system, but its tutorial 
document is part of the text-processing 
system. Similarly, the Id (the program 
that is Xenix’s linkage editor, analogous to 
DOS’s LINK command) program is part 
of the base system, and the base system 
contains a manual page for 1 d , but a much 
more exhaustive manual page for Id ac- 
companies the software development sys- 
tem. These manuals are tolerable, but you 
need to take a deep breath and prepare the 
dormant academician in you in order to 
survive. 

Oiir biggest reservation about these 
manuals is their abandonment of the tradi- 
tional eight-part format found in older 
UNIX manuals. While UNIX’s documen- 
tation may not be the user’s ideal, it is im- 
peccably organized. In Xenix, descrip- 
tions of the system calls and subroutines 
are combined in one section instead of in 
two separate sections as in other UNIX 
manuals. The commands are described in 
three sections, not one as in other UNIX 
manuals. Many of the entries in the miscel- 
laneous section, such as the description of 
the termcap file, seem to belong in oth- 
er sections. 

SCO offers a two-tiered support plan it 
quaintly calls SoftCare Support Services. 
In the Level I plan, SCO responds only to 
written requests for software assistance. 
The postal system is an antiquated form of 
communications for a progressive compa- 
ny that prides itself on the communications 
capabilities of its operating system. Soft- 
care Level n is for more-demanding users; 
this level gives you direct access to the 
Support Center via a toll-free hotline. 
Xenix users we’ve spoken to are generally 
pleased with the support they’ve received. 

We found SCO’s support ultimately 

helpful, but less than timely; the support 
staff made us wait 3 weeks for answers to 
several questions. The most disturbing of 
our questions concerned copy protection. 
Xenix requires you to enter a serial number 
and an activation number before you can 
proceed with an installation; if you enter an 
incorrect number, Xenix won’t boot. Ob- 
viously this is not disk-based copy protec- 
tion k la DOS, but there is cleariy some 
form of accountability involved in using 
this system. The SCO spokespeople to 
whom we spoke said the numbCT is used 
only as a way of tracking users for custom- 
er support. 

EVERYONE’S CUP OF TEA? If visions 
of multitasking dance in your head, pro- 
ceed cautiously with Xenix System V. The 
gap between single-user DOS and UNIX is 
large, and the bridge is rickety. Knowl- 
edge of DOS almost gets in the way of 
learning Xenix fundamentals. 

With over 3,500 pages of documenta- 
tion in seven manuals, Xenix is not a “let’s 
give it a try” system. The number and 
quality of applications programs are still 
pretty slim pickings even though the pic- 
ture gets better all the time (see sidebar 
“Off-the-Shelf Software for Xenix”), and 
users with a DOS background are bound to 
find the applications complete but terribly 
obscure. Although the picture is changing, 
Xenix is still at its best in a programmer’s 
environment or in an end-user environ- 
ment where a turnkey system is the ulti- 
mate goal. 

It’ s not hard to find a few glitches in any 
software system that consists of 300 pro- 
grams, and SCO’s Xenix System V cer- 
tainly has shortcomings, but we fully ex- 
pect continued improvement from SCO. 
Xenix’s performance is excellent on an 
AT; we experienced no crashes in about a 
month of hard, explorative use, and the 
many miscellaneous glitches and gotchas 
ofearlierXenix systems are absent. Every- 
thing considered, Xenix System V is an 
impressive version of the UNIX system. GH 

Robin Raskin is a frequent contributor to 
PC Magazine. Kaare Christian puls to- 
gether computer systems for vision re- 
search at The Rockefeller University in 
New York. He is the author of The UNIX 
Operating System (John Wiley, 1983). 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
266 




Remote lets yoti ran almost any progrzun, from any location, as If you were there. 


Remote is the software that turns your personal computer in- 
to a host computer. You or anyone you choose can dial it up 
ftom almost any terminal in almost any location, and run most 
popular application programs such as word processing, spread- 
sheets, and data base managers. 

You'll see the program on your remote terminal screen as if 
you were seated at the host PC. 

While Remote itself becomes transparent in use. it offers 
some very tangible benefits; 

• You don't need a second PC to do the job of two. Almost any 
terminal or terminal emulator will do. The only software you 
need is the software in your host PC. 


• Each of several different users can call in from anywhere in 
the world and use the host rc and software. Remote includes a 
sophisticated electronic mail system with encrypted messages 
and individual password protection. 

• You can transfer files to and from the host computer, using 
the Crosstalk or XMODEM protocol. 

• Programmers and software vendors can use Remote to debug 
a client's software by phone, without leaving their own offices. 

Imagine the potential Remote has in extending the power of 
your own PC. Ask your dealer about it, or write for details. 

iMICRQSTlJFr 

1 000 Holcomb Woods Parkway 
Roswell, Georgia 30076 


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REMOTl is a tradcmailr Uicrostuf. Inc 
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computer so small, so light, and 
so fast it defines a new industry stan- 
dard. From the same company that 
set the standard— COMPAQ! The new 
COMPAQ PORTABLE IP" has all the 
advantages of the world's best-selling 
full-function portable— the original 
COMPAQ Portable— plus it's even 
more portable. And it's far more 
powerful than most desktop 
computers. Never before has 
a computer this small been 
capable of so much. 

With its 80286 processor, 
the COMPAQ PORTABLE II 
can run all of the popular 
business software written for IBM* personal comput- 
ers. At speeds three to five times faster than the COMPAQ 
Portable, IBM PC/XT™ and other compatibles. 

And because of its standard 360-Kbyte diskette 
drive format, your data diskettes will be fully inter- 
changeable with other COMPAQ, IBM, and compati- 
ble personal computers. 


Expansion potential? The 
COMPAQ PORTABLE II can handle 
an optional 10- or 20-Megabyte 
fixed disk drive and up to 4.1 Mega- 
bytes of RAM. And you can add a 
modem, a networking board, or a 
board for communicating with your 
mainframe. 

The new COMPAQ PORTABLE H 
puts tremendous computing poten- 
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computer user. It's backed 
by the service and support 
of over 2900 Authorized 
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For the name of the dealer nearest you, call toll- 
free 1-800-231-0900 and ask for Operator 16. In 
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IBM' is a registered trademark and IBM PC/XT'’*' is a trademark of Interna- 
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■ SPECIAL REPORT 


PROJECT 

DATATT 

baseII 


Relatively simple flat-file managers are 
often passed over in favor of more- 
sophisticated databases. Complexity, 
however, doesn’ t necessarily imply 
efficiency. These 18 DBMS’s are worth 
serious corporate evaluation. 


FT,AT-Fn,F. 

DATABASES 

I n the first segment of our three-part Project Database II series 
(Volume 5 Number 12), we looked at relational database 
management systems. These high-end products give you the 
ability to link separate files through related fields or even to 
create individual applications using the software’s built-in 
programming language. 

The flat-file database systems reviewed here and those re- 
viewed last issue are more basic in structure: they accept information, 
reorganize it into a variety of formats, and exhibit it neatly on-screen or 
on a printed page. These databases are therefore more limited in scope 
than their more sophisticated cousins and consequently may not be suit- 
ed to large-scale business applications. 

However, these products are not as humble as you might think. Most 
have slick interfaces and are quickly accessible to computer novices 
who can soon upload, add, resort, and print out data without spending 
long hours with tutorials. And, as you can see in the accompanying fea- 
tures table, many include advanced functions that would not be out of 
place in the most sophisticated DBMS software. In fact, although tech- 
nically they may not be relational, some flat-file programs incorporate 
file-linking features that place them very close to the boundary. A wise 
manager will take a close look at the following products before moving 
on to their more exotic relatives. 

— ^Barbara KrasnofT 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
269 


■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 




FACT FILE 




Alpha/three, Version 1.0 

Alpha Software Corp. 

30 B Si.: Burlington. MA 01803; (617) 229-2924 

List Price: $39S Requires: 2S6K RAM. two disk drives (hard disk 

recomrrwnded). DOS 2.0 or later. 

In Short: AlphaJihree is compatible with dBASE III files, supports relational 
operations such as joins. 


comes with a variety of 
sophisticated output ca- 
pabilities. and is easy 
enough to use without a 
manual. Not cc^ pro- 
tected. 


With Alpha/lhree, you 
can create search 
criteria with a table 
mode or an equation 
mode. This flexibility 
is available in many of 
the program's 
features. 




ALPHA/THREE 


If you need the power of Ashton-Tate’s 
dBASE HI but can’t abide complexity or a 
command-driven interface, Alpha Soft- 
ware’s newest offering. Alpha/three, may 
be right up your alley. Alpha/lhree is a 
menu-driven flat-file manager that acts as 
though it were a customized blend of 
dBASE HI, Microrim’s R:base 5000, and 
Borland International’s Reflex. Alpha 
Software couldn’t have picked three better 
programs on which to base Alphallhiree's 
design, interface, and features. 

While it opens c^y one file at a time, 
Alpha/lhree offers enough relational capa- 
bilities to make you question its categori- 
zation as a flat-file manager. It manipu- 
lates dBASE III files (including memo 
files) without importing, switches between 
form and browse modes, and permits user- 
defined data entry rules. Other capabilities 
include a respect^le report generator, spe- 
cial modules for creating mailing lists and 
form letters, extremely powerful indexing 
features, and three methods for searching 
for specific records. 

Because the internal database formats 
are similar, Alpha/lhree accepts all of 
dBASE Ill's field types (including Memo 
fields) and lengths as its own. Manipulat- 
ing a dBASE HI file is a snap — you simply 
begin using it. Alpha/lhree also supports 
dBASE Ill's operators and functions. Al- 
though the program does not have a proce- 
dural language, you can use the fimctions 
to create expressions in reports and que- 
ries. For example, you can globally search 
for every record whose Salary field is 
“>=45000 .OR. <= 25000 .AND. > 
15000.” 

MORE THAN ONE dBASE FILE You 

can even work with more than one dBASE 
file by using one of the relational com- 
mands: Join, Subtract, or Intersect. You 
simply log onto one database .select anoth- 
er (which needs to be indexed) and then 
pick the fields that will appear in the new 
file. When I joined the Category 3 files 
into one file and ran the appropriate bench- 
mark tests, the overall time from booting 
the program to printing the various reports 
to screen took a little more than an hour. 

Importing files from other programs is 


almost as easy. You select the appropriate 
file format from a variety of choices, have 
Alpha/lhree determine the fields and their 
lengths from the file, and optionally 
change any you wish. 


■ It opens only one 
file at a time, but Alpha! 
three offers enough 
relational capabilities to 
make you question 
its categorization as a 
flat-file manager. 

Alpha/lhree resembles Borland’s Re- 
flex in three areas: its use of pop-up win- 
dows for displaying selections, its use of 
form and browse modes, and its ability to 
rearrange columns in the browse mode. 
You can pop up a window whenever a 


menu requires input based on known crite- 
ria, such as field names and functions. You 
change from form view to browse view 
with one keystroke. (I hope a future ver- 
sion enables both views on-screen at the 
same time.) When in browse mode, you 
can rearrange columns so that, for exam- 
ple, the first column is alongside the last. 
The rearrangement can optionally be 
saved. 

R:base 5000's contributions include the 
ability to set up data entry mies for check- 
ing ranges and exceptions. For example, 
you can set up a case conversion function 
so that data is automatically converted to a 
specified format such as all upper case or 
initial capitalization. You can also use 
mIes to create calculated fields. 

POWERFm INDEXING Like R. hare 
5000, Alpha/lhree discourages physically 
altering the database. Unlike R.base 5000, 
though, Alpha/lhree does not offer a sort 
option. Before you think this limits the 
program’s usefulness, know that its index- 
ing functions are extremely powerful and 
more than reasonably fast. With them, you 
can query or produce reports using any 
range of records in any order you like. In- 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
270 



dexes can be based on one or more fields 
and they can include both ascending and 
descending orders. (The latter capability 
enabled me to produce a report with an as- 
cending Eiepaitment field and a descend- 
ing Salary field.) You can even set the pri- 
mary index to a stored search criterion. 

Alpha/three’s output capabilities in- 
clude a potpourri of forms: input, mailing 
label, form letter, and full-fledged report. 
With the mailing-label option, you can 
print up to 999 copies of six labels across, 
and specify the number of columns be- 
tween labels, the column width, and its 
height. Form letters can include prompts 
for keyboard input, boilerplates, and es- 
cape-code sequences for printer enhance- 
ments. Also supported are block-editing 
features, equations, and conditionals. The 
report generator permits calculated fields, 
three break points, title page information, 
headers and footers, and a summary sec- 
tion. You can globally format data for dif- 
ferent types, specify the actual length and 
the window length, and suppress blank 
lines. 

As good as Alpha/three is, it is not for 
everyone. For one thing, its lack of a pro- 
cedural language prevents you from creat- 
ing a turnkey system. Tme, Alpha Soft- 
ware sends you a copy of its Keyworks 
when you turn in the registration card, but 
macros have their limitations; and you can 
port your database to dBASE HI and its 


■ Alpha! three' 
capabilities include 
a potpourri of forms: 
input, mailing label, 
form letter, and 
full-fledged report. 


programming language, but that presumes 
you own dBASE HI. For another, you may 
find its one line of help insufficient (I 
didn't) or its menus tedious (only if you are 
used to command-line processing). 

Eiespite these limitations, though. Al- 


pha/three should become extremely popu- 
lar in a short time. It has everything a data- 
base should have: power, flexibility, and 
ease of use. Because of its compatibility 
with dBASE HI, it even has something that 
only well-established programs have — ac- 
cess to previously created datafiles. Even 
if you never intend to use dBASE HI, Al- 
phalthree can answer most of your data- 
base needs. — Vincent Puglia 


C.I.P. 


C.I.P. (The Concentric Information 
Processor) from Concentric Data Systems 
is a frrst-class product in every sense of the 
word. 

C.I.P. comes on three disks and is not 
copy protected. Installation on either a 
hard disk or floppy, which takes about 5 
minutes, is extremely simple. The new 
user is greeted by a well-wrought manual 
that includes an excellent 200-page tutori- 
al , a quick start-up section for more experi- 
enced users, and a well-written reference 
section. 

C.I.P. is outstanding in the way it com- 


municates with the user. The program uti- 
lizes a combination of function keys, 
menus, and an on-line help facility to ef- 
fordessly guide you through every feature. 
Once you get to know the program, it be- 
comes a simple matter to quickly move 
from feature to feature. 

The program presents its choices 
through well-designed screens that are 
easy to understand and use. Simple file and 
field definition enables you to quickly de- 
fuie a database. 

A LOT OF DATA TYPES The program 
provides a wealth of data types, including 
date, calculated, m^st-fill, and unique 
types. Fields may consist of one or more 
data-type attributes; for example, a field 
might be classified as an auto, must-fill, 
unique field. Making changes to field defi- 
nitions is a simple matter. 

The C.I.P. system requires that you 
give careful consideradon to file construc- 
don. Indexing is accomplished by desig- 
nating key fields during file definidon. 
Data can only be searched for on those 
fields designated as being key fields. 
While it is possible to defme each field as a 
key, careful thought can keep file over- 


F A C T FIFE 


C.I.P., Version Ic 

Concentric Data Systems Inc. 

P.O. Box 4063; Westborough. MA 01581; (617) 366-1 122 
List Price: S295 Requires: 128K RAM. twodisk drives. DOS l.lorlaier. 
In Short: C.I.P. (The Concentric Infomiation Processor) is an excellent flat- 
file database that excels in the design of its user interface and in its variety of 
file 

copy protected. 



r/t^- C.I.P. report 
writer Print Options 
menu shows extensive 
printer-control 
capabilities, including 
the Mailing Labels 
option as shown on 
the lower right. 


NiMbFP of copits: 1 
:r;/iter IBW0/EPSOH 

T:t iiif};- , 

ffir:;' 

CC'fTFrtij No 

'as* *<■ 

Lires psr i 

BIsrii. li'Ti ii;*: 'Ti: 
Pnrt Fi.-t’ 

Print It*' No 

iltv i:**; c:*a' 
Biarf Ir*- a:*?: cr*- 
- c- — - (I 


fi) 'i';-* AIm2SS 
‘i.i y ./ No 
i jt.’iritir Ir* Ho 
•urr:r - 

i No 

T T * ii Q 

1 i A Vts 
;a-. ;:*.i AImds 
H o 

:r;H 2 

:t liitlj 4.8 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
271 


F L A T - F I 

LE DATABASES 






















File Structure Limits Data types and Sizes 


Times in Seconds 

Data Enin and EWiK 

PRODUCT NAME 

3D 

r> 

m 

Number of fields per record 

Record size 

necoras per aaia nw 

Records per database 

Field size 

Characters 

1 

Z 

o> 

03 

c 

Floattng-potnt 1 

e 

O 

s 

Logical (Boolean) 

To 

o 

«3 

E 

Long text 

Sort data file by last name 

Index records 

e 

X 

'i 

1 

> 

a 

« 

1 

1 

Retrieve and display record without index 

Execute entire report 

Sort data file by salary 

Range testing 

Default values 

Require specific values 

Lookup to external (fata table 

Double-entry verification 

Required fields 

Must-fill field 

Forced uppercase 

1 Date conversions 

Automatic incrementing fields 

Unique fields 

1 'i H Alpha/three 

S 395 128 4000 6SSS6 6S6S6 256 ■ 

■ 




■ 

■ 


■ NA 

3.02 1.59 3.09 TI.45 NA 

■ 



■ 


■ 


■ 

■ 


■ 

fJflC.I.R 

295 40 2000 65000 6S000 50 ■ 






■ 


8 

16.2 


1 NA 71.6 9.2 





■ 


■ 

■ 

■ 


■ 

Courtney Database 

95 99 2048 32768 32766 70 ■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 



■ 


2.6 

NA 

NA NA NA 3.3 

■ 



■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 



■ 


D3taPlus-86 

88 24 960 

90 X 40 ■ 

■ 

■ 


■ 


■ 


3.53 3.71 


5 4 71 3.88 









■ 



The Data Reporter 

199 36 1800 300 LC 254 ■ 

■ 

■ 


■ 

■ 

■ 


1.17 

2.81 

144 IN 160 1.5 

■ 





■ 



■ 


■ 

Rexifller 

S 79 15 30 5000 5000 30 ■ 

■ 

■ 






8 

NA 

NA 2.8 54 11 








■ 




form Manager 

195 500 20000 32767 32767 80 ■ 









NA 

1.7 NA 29.5 NA 

■ 





■ 



■ 

■ 


Framework II 

69 5 32000 32000 ^ 64000 ■ 









NA 

NA 1.4 NA NA 

■ 



■ 





■ 

■ 


Goldengate 

695 160 6S536 6S000 65000 2 55 ■ 

■ 

■ 


■ 


■ 

■ 

3 

NA 

NA 4.5 42.4 3.5 




■ 

■ 




■ 


■ 

InfoStar Plus 

295 200 4000 32000 32000 255 ■ 








■ 10.2 

5.0 

2.3 NA NA 13.7 












Palantir Filer 

$ 145 150 12K 

X 9999999 80 H 

■ 

■ 

■ 





7.34 6.45 0.64 1.72 3.88 7.60 










■ 


PC-File III 

59.95 42 166 32767 32767 « ■ 

■ 


■ 



■ 

■ 

■ 8 

1 


1 1 180 12 






■ 




■ 

■ 

PeachText 5000 

295 14 509 32000 32000 63 ■ 








NA 

NA 

0.7 NA 9.6 NA 






■ 






Personal Decision Series 

275 100 4096 

90 X 40 8 

■ 

■ 

■ 


■ 



15 

23 

1.5 3 124 19 

■ 





■ 






[Jijo&A 

299 240016.760 16M 16M 1678 ■ 

■ 



■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 3.5 

1.5 


2 2 7 3.5 

■ 



■ 


■ 


■ 

■ 



Query III 

S 99.95 255 4095 65535 65535 255 ■ 








7 

NA 

NA 1.2 NA NA 





■ 







Reflex. The Analyst 

149.95 250 63500 65500 65500 254 

■ 

■ 




■ 


■ 1.10 

NA 

.83 .99 8.50 1.32 

■ 








■ 



UNI-FILE 

195 99 

90 X 80 ■ 

■ 





■ 


NA 

NA 


1 2 40 NA 

■ 



■ 


■ 





■ 

LEGEND: X— Unlimited NA- 

-Not applicable LC— Limited by machine capacity 



] 

-Indicates Editor's Choice IN— Information not available 








head down. You can change a field's key 












on the screen to create a free-form, cus- 

status at any time. 

Once the database has been defined, in- 
formation can be entered, changed, ma- 
nipulated, deleted, and reorganized. 
C.I.P. presents a basic view of the data 
fields, but an option allows you to lay a 
view out on the screen in a way that direct- 
ly suits an application’s needs. 

ONE KEY-FIELD SEARCHES 

C.I.P.'s only limitation is that it bases a 
search for a record on only one key field. 
Compound field searching is not available. 
Further, sorting can only be accomplished 

■ For basic single- 
file data management, 
C.I.P. provides all 
the tools necessary to 
build and maintain 
real applications. 



tomized output format. Totals, subtotals, 
and counts are all available options. Head- 
ers and footers can be added, and the pro- 
gram allows for extensive control of the 
printed output. The report writer also al- 
lows the printing of mailing labels. 

C.I.P. provides more features than the 
usual simple flat-file database. It can im- 
port and export DIF and ASCII files, it can 
merge C.I.P. files with standard ASCII 
files, it provides rudimentary password 
protection, and it can support a fairly large 
database (up to 65,(XX) records of 2, (XX) 
characters each). 

through the report writer at the time of re- 
port generation. C.I.P. will allow sorting 
on up to four fields, in either ascending or 
descending order. 

The report writer is excellent. C.I.P. al- 

lows report formatting in an interesting 
and unique manner. It presents you with a 
standard view of each defined field and 
then allows you to move each field about 


For basic single-file data management, 
C.I.P. provides all the tools necessary to 
build and maintain real applications. It is a 
satisfying product to use and is highly rec- 
ommended. — ^Tony Rizzo 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
272 







< 

Data ImperPExporl Data Maaipalatloa 

Command Strategy 

Oltk RaaairaiMata 

Sappoit Malarial 


Static 

Dynamic 

Typed 

Number of 


menus 

menus 

com- 

distribution 

Tutorial 

with; 

with; 

mands 

diskettes 



Si 

-S Sl 

'111 
•-if *5 b 




II 


'll 

11 

^ a » 

ia-i* 

•3 5 

aa 

S £f ^ 

e c I 

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0 no import or export B import 3 export B both import and export * poor * average * good ** excellent 


COURTNEY 

DATABASE 


The unlikely name of Courtney and a 
three-ring binder of documentation that is 
not typeset might lead you to quickly dis- 
miss this database as second rate. But a 
closer examination distinguishes the 
Courtney Database as a first-rate file man- 
ager and report generator with an excellent 
selection of features. 

Courtney starts up quickly and presents 
a menu of 18 choices from six function 
groups. You define the file structure of the 
databa.se with the fust choice on the menu. 
Each field receives a prompt that appears 
on the data input form and a name that ap- 
pears on any reports that are generated. 


■ CoMrm^y’ s report- 
generator is powerful. If 
you want to produce a 
report quickly, you name 
the fields, and Courtney 
does the rest. 


However, the name is limited to eight 
characters, which often is not enough for 
reports. Fields ate placed on the form by 
defining row and column coordinates — 


much more of a hassle than simply zipping 
around the screen with the cursor keys to 
define a form. 

DATA HANDLING Field input specs 
give you a feel for what the program can 
do. Besides those found on most file man- 
agers, the specs also include must-fill 
fields, skipp^ fields, conditional defaults, 
and check digits. 

Other menu choices in the file design 
group further enhance the program's abili- 
ty to manage your data. You may issue 
constraints on the data input to a field, and 
you can establish code and fill fields. A 
code field is one, such as a ZIP Code field, 
that you can use to enter or fill data auto- 
matically into other fields, such as the City 
and State fields. 

After you define a file and enter data 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
273 


































PRACTICAL. 

THEPEDPLE WHOPRAC 



IMPK 


C 'omputervision is proud 
to bring you the Personal 
Designer. Our world leading 
CAD technology, now on a 
personal computer. 


Computervision is already a 
leader in engineering CAD, 
with continuous involvement 
in important design projects. 


What you get is software 
for IBM personal computers 
that helps you create every- 
thing from complex design 
layouts to detailed drawngs. 
Whether you’re working on 
door knobs or race cars, the 
Personal Designer is for you. 

7 ^ he system provides 
visualization of your 3-D 
designs from any orienta- 
tion. Addresses drafting and 
complex surfaces. And 
creates shaded pictures, too! 
The entire range of CAD. 
Ready to bring your ideas 
to market. 

And because the Personal 
Designer is from Computer- 
vision, it’s compatible with 
our other systems. Pro- 
tecting your investment, 
/ and letting you extend 
CAD to more people, 
at less cost. 

Practical CAD. With 
flexible software. 


ABOVE. With the Personal 
Designer you can create a 2-i 
or 3-D conceptual layout 
permitting you to assess . 
function and validate size 
and clearance. You can even 
create models of complex, 
free-form surfaces to help 
you evaluate your design for 
shape, function, and 
appearance. 


jNC, ROCiER PENSKE 
iDV 



C4DFR0M 





1223 




Goice 




ABOVE. Accurate detail 
and assembly drawings may 
be plotted in almost any 
size, with the ability for 
drafters to easily add 
dimensions, text, standard 
symbols, and even the cus- 
tom symbols of your partic- 
ular business. 

LEFT. Shaded modeling 
lets you view your design 
from any orientation, so 
you can evaluate aesthetics, 
ergonomics, or test for 
surface interference. 


— 3B — 1 

1 1 

’4ce 

t 

1 

3 Z* 

CLWr 1 


jto< asDfl 


oax I 

- 1 ij.rs 

OSM 9*.| 

>\ *493 

V9.|l 

• !:» » 

CM RJtVl 


(kw m 

:»l '*i3 Iv^ •*'■>1 


expandable hardware, and a 
worldwide system of sup- 
port, service and training. 

V/bu knew a system like 
I this would come along 
someday. And of course, 
Computervision had to do it. 


/ T" or more information on 
the Personal Designer or 
for the name of the nearest 
dealer, write Personal 
Systems Business Unit, 

100 Crosby Drive, Bedford, 
MA 01730. 


K/ 

COMPUTERVISIOINi 

Manufacturers Of CAD/CAM systems for 
Automotive • Aerosoace • Mechanical Machinery 
• Electroncs/Electncal Machinery • Architecture. 
Engineering & Construction • Fabricated Materials 

CIRCLE 159 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


k 


FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


FAC r F I 1. f: 


Courtney Database, Version 3.0 

CiHJitney Business Systems Inc. 

710 W. Main;Arlingu>n.TX 76013; (817) 275-6710 
l.ts! Price: $95. (X) Requires: I92KRAM,lwodiskdrives.DOS2.0orlater. 
In Short: A firsl-raic file manager with a powerful . flexible report generator, 
Courtney Database is easy to leam and use. You can use it to create detailed 
forms as well as colum- 
nar reports. Not copy 
protected. 




Counney Databasc'js 
rnain menu has 18 
chtnees wahin six 
function groups, and a 
file-status line for easy 
reference. 



into it, you can perform the usual tasks of 
sorting and searching for records. One of 
the limitations of the search feature, how- 
ever, is that you cannot search on more 
than one field. If you wanted to find the re- 
cord of Mr. Jones who lives in Kalama- 
zoo, for example, you cannot do it in one 
step. You can do these kinds of searches, 
however, when producing a printed report 
or when viewing selected records of a file. 

REPORTING Courtney’s report-gener- 
ator is powerful and flexible. If you want 
to produce a report quickly, you name the 
fields, and Courtney does the rest. If you 
are dissatisfied with the look of the report, 
you can shift the columns by entering 
numbers that indicate where the columns 
should be placed. Special effects, such as 
breakpoints and subtotals, ate also easy to 
do. (Remember, you're limited to eight 
characters on column headings.) 

In addition to columnar reports, the 
Courtney Database also lets you generate 
detailed forms by specifying with row and 
column coordinates where text and field 
information is to be placed. Admittedly, 
this is not the easiest way to generate such 
forms, but it is precise. A problem does 


arise, however, when you generate mail- 
ing label forms. The program does not de- 
lete unnecessary spaces, so if the first 
name and last name are in two different 
fields on the input form, you could wind 
up with several spaces between the two on 
the label. 

Learning to use the Courtney Database 
is a snap because the program, documenta- 


■ Learning to use 
the Courtney Database 
is a snap because the 
program, documentation, 
and tutorial are all 
well organized. 

tion, and tutorial are all well organized. 
The tutorial not only teaches you the basics 
of the program, but through real-world 
problems and solutions it gives you good 


insight into what the program can do. 

Though Courtney does have some limi- 
tations. they ate greatly outweighed by its 
first-rate features and performance. If 
you’re interested in a file manager and re- 
port generator of this type, you’d be well- 
advised to consider the Courtney Data- 
base. — ^Joe Desposito 


THE DATA 

REPORTER 

The Data Reporter is an interesting data- 
base that manages to display some impres- 
sive feahues, even though it does lack 
some basic elements. Notably, it doesn’t 
import and export files. But a look beyond 
the program bugs and incomplete docu- 
mentation reveals a sophisticated file man- 
ager in need of refinement. 

Setting up basic data records in The 
Data Reporter is straightforward. Follow- 
ing the steps from the master menu to the 
completion of the file setup is easy. You 
are allowed a good range of field types, 
from alphanumeric to monetary, as well as 
flexible calculated fields. A good report 
writer lets you set up formatted reports; it 
also incorporates data into the text of re- 
ports, tables, and form letters with codes 
that littk data in the setup file to the report 
format. 

SORTING AND GRAPHING The pro- 
gram’s Search and Sort features are partic- 
ularly noteworthy. You can choose from 
six search types, including approximate 
spelling searches and impressive range 
searches. You can sort one or several sub- 
files, and this sorting tool is mote than ade- 
quate for most users’ needs. Both the 
Search and the Sort features execute at 
lightning speed. Also, a helpful batch 
command option lets you program up to 60 
routine batch functions within The Data 
Reporter. 

The program’s graphics package cre- 
ates bar and line graphs, pie charts, and 
scatter graphs fast and easily. The Data 
Reporter will take your data records and 
within milliseconds will transform them 
into a bar graph. A few more keystrokes 
results in a statistical chart of the graph you 
just made, listing the field name graphed. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1985 
276 



F 

L A T - F 1 L 

E 

1) A T A 

It A 

s 

E 

s 






















Input Facililies 

Output Facilities 








Special Features 










Screen 

delinitton 

Report 

generation 


Report 

definition 

method 





Output 

reports 

to: 

Query 

language 




High-level 

language 

interface 


PRODUCT NAME 

Painting I 

Coordinate specification 

Automatic 

Programming 

Number of screens per tile 

Number of files per screen 

Prompt messages for fields 

Arithmetic functions | 

Aggregate functions 

Statistical functions 

Multiple file reports 1 

Predefined mailing labels 

o 

c 

£ 

Form layout , 

Automatic 

Programming 

Stored report definitions 

Headers 

Footers 

Printer setup facility 

Printer i 

Screen 

Disk file 

Multiple tile access 

Stored queries 1 

Boolean expressions 

Phonetic searching j 

Global searches 1 

DOS 2.0 directory support 

Change default directory 

Access from another directory 

Macros 

Customize keyboard 

Customize color screen 

User access security provisions 

Data encryption 

BASIC 1 

Pascal 

C 

COBOL 

FORTRAN 

Assembler 

Proprietary high-level language 



Alpha three 

■ 



























ih 

C.I.P 

■ 

■ 1 1 




■ 


■ 





■ 








■ 







Courtney Database 


■ 9 

■ 


■ 




■ 

■ 



















DataPlus-86 

■ 

■ X 

■ 




■ 

m 

■ 

■ 












■ ■ 







The Data Reporter 

■ 



























Flexitller 


■ 1 1 







■ 












■ 







Form Manager 

■ 

■ ■ 20 

■ ■ 


■ 




■ 





■ 







■ 

■ ■ 

■ 

■ 


■ 

■■■■■■ 


Framework II 


■ X 1 






■ 

















■ 


Goldengate 


■ 1 1 



■ 




■ 









■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 





InfoStar Plus 

■ 

10 1 ■ 





















■ 





Palantir Filer 

■ 

20 

■ 


■ 



m 






■ 







■ 

■ ■ ■ ■ 







PC-Flle III 




























Peach Text 5000 


■ 1 

■ 




■ 

m 


■ 










■ 

■ 

■ ■ ■ ■ 


■ 





Personal Decision Series 


■ s t ■ ■ 




■ 



■ 










■ 

■ 

■ ■ ■ ■ ■ 


■ 






Q&A 

■ 

■ 1 

■ ■ 







■ 



















Query III 


1 1 




■ 




■ 









■ 

■ 

■ ■ 







Reflex, The Analyst 

■ 

50 

■ 


■ 




■ 





■ 








■ ■ ■ ■ 







UNI-FILE 

■ ■ 5 98 ■ 



















■ 


■ ■ 





LEGEND: x— Unlimited - 

Indicates Editor's Choice 

























OUR REVIEWERS 

Bruce Bro» n is a principal at Soft In- 
dustries Corp. and founding president of 
the Connecticut Computer Srxiety. He 
leaches courses in business conipulcr use 
at three Connecticut colleges. He is also 
cofounder of the MicrtKompuler Train- 
ing As,sociation. 

Joe Desposito was formerly a techni- 
cal editor at Computers & Electronics 
and Creative Computing. He is now' a 
free-lance writer specializing in comput- 
er software and hardware and is a fre- 
quent conuibutor to PC Magazine. 

Virginia Dudek is a fomter a.ssistant 

editor at PC Magazine. She is now a free- 
lance writer in New York. 

Christina Dyar is an editorial assis- 
tant at PC Magazine. 

Cher) 1 J . (ioldberg is a staff editor at 
PC Magazine. 

Janet Lewis is senior copy editor at 
PC Magazine. 

Vincent Puglia writes frequently for 
PC Magazine and reviewed programs in 
our first Project Database in 1984. He has 
written for Changing Times, Video, and 
numerous computer-related newsletters 
and has edited brxrks for the New York 

City Board of Education. 

Dick Kidington is a consultant and 
principal at Soft Industries Corp. He is 
mauthoT of Hidden Power of Ijitus 1-2-3 
Using Macros. 

Tony Rizzo is a.ssistant director of in- 
formation technologies at New York 
University School of Continuing Educa- 
tion. He specializes in data processing, 
office automation, personal computer 
training, and curriculum development. 
Rizzo serves a.s a professional computer 
consultant for the schixil division of per- 
sonnel and industrial programs. 


































PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 

in 


■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


number of reconls graphed, and how the 
records are grouped. It's a complete visual 
representation of your data. 

WHAT WENT AWRY? The Dam Re- 
porter still needs some work before it can 
compete with the top performers in this 
category. It’s written in BASIC, and that’s 
OK, except that on the version PC 
Magazine Labs tested, the program’s 
error-trapping capabilities often went 
right into BASIC error messages instead 
of telling you in plain English what went 
wrong. Repeated testing of the same pro- 
cedure often resulted in various BASIC 
error messages ’ being displayed for the same 
sequence of commands with The Data 
Reporter program. The Reformatter fea- 
ture, for example, which lets you rearrange 
the fields in a data record, was particularly 
problematic. 

BASIC prompts got in the way again 
when I exited the program and entered 
SYSTEM to go into IX)S. A file that 
would let you go tight into DOS would be 
helpful. 

According to a Softwest Programming 
spokesman, a new version of The Data Re- 
porter, scheduled for release this spring. 


■ The Data Reporter 
will take your data records 
and within milliseconds 
will transform them into 
a bar graph. 


will iron out some of the bugs I encoun- 
tered, such as troublesome multiple file 
sorts. The company spokesman also 
claims that the new version will be able to 
import and export data files. 

If Softwest Programming would work 
on the BASIC error messages and comb 
through its documentation to include re- 
vised descriptions of. for example, instal- 
lation of the program on a hard disk, this 
database would be easier on the eyes and 
on the nerves. In its current version. The 
Data Reporter comes within inches of be- 
ing a fast and mean database for the 
price. — ^Virginia Dudek 


DATAPLUS-86 


If you’ve never used a database manage- 
ment program before but your data man- 
agement needs outweigh your resistance to 
learning a new program. Professional 
Software Inc. has an answer DataPlus- 
86. This menu-driven database is easy to 
learn and use. On-screen prompts guide 
you through every menu operation, and 
the printed tutorial and reference manual 
are as thorough as you’d want them to be. 

Except for the initial process of defin- 
ing records, which the program takes you 
to automatically, DataPlus-86 revolves 
around its menus: the main menu, the 
global menu that is responsible for search 
and replace and other global update func- 
tions, and the utilities menu that lets you 
add files, print field titles, change file ti- 
tles, and so forth. 

Both using these menus and the menu 
operations themselves are straightforward. 
You don’t even have to learn commands. 
You simply make a selection from one of 
the menus, and then follow the prompts at 
the bottom of your screen. 

You can use the field titles that Dam- 
Plus-86 suggests or create up to 24 of your 
own. For the database to process your data 
correctly, you must follow the prescribed 
methods for entering field titles. For exam- 
ple, field titles containing dollar amounts 
must begin with a dollar sign, integer field 
titles must begin with a number sign (#), 
and date fields must begin with the word 
date. 

In addition to holding text, fields can 
contain mathematical formulas that per- 
form calculations between two other 
fields. Toease data entry, the program also 
allows you to import and convert ASCII 
files into a DataPlus-86 format, as long as 
the data for each field is followed by a car- 
riage return. 

SORTS AND REPORTS DamPlus-86 
gives you a nice variety of data manipula- 
tion and report features. The sort feature 
lets you do two-level sorts or create an in- 
dex. The report generator allows you to 
make data tables, which can include math- 
ematical calculations. You can specify 
page breaks as well as print titles and notes 
on your reports. 


FACT FILE 


The Data Reporter, Version 2.01 
Softwest Piognunming 

4418 E. Chapman Ave.. #156; Orange. CA 92669; (800) 441 -6666; 
(714)730-1157 

LisI Price: $199 Requires: 256K RAM, one double-sided disk drive, 
DOS 2. 1 or later. In Sliort: This database manager comes within inches of 

being a fast and mean 
competitor for the price, 
but, incredibly, it doesn't 
import or export data. 

Not copy protected. 


.iKif 



The Data Repoiter’5 
graphics package 
gives you the option of 
generating a statistical 
report on any data 
file. 


30500 1 

1 10 

.*0 

•2130 : 

1 1 0 

41 

40290 ; 

45300 i 

; 1 0 

1 1 0 

4e3O0 1 

1 10 

."0 

50;<9C : 

I 1.0 


i 

1 1.0 

1 1 0 

-I 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
278 








l^E IHE BRAINS YOUR IBM 
WASN’T BORN VWm 


Right at your fingertips 
in CompuServe’s IBM* 
Forums. 

In the IBM New lisa's FDrum you’ll 
swap ideas with other new PC users, leam 
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In the IBM Software Forum you’ll 
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The IBM Hardware Forum addresses 
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Use the Forum Message Board to send 
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Join ongoing, real-time discussions in a 
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AH you need is your IBM (H- nSM- 
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800 - 848-8199 

In Ohio, Call 614-457-0802 
An H8R Blocfc Company 


CIRCLE 226 ON READER SERVICE CARD 





FLAT-FILE DATABASES 




F A C T F I 1. 1-; 


DalaPUis-H6, Version PC -86 
Universal Software Co. 

51)0 E. Oak Sl; Fori Collins, CO 80524; (303) 221-5.367 
I.is! fVitc: S88 Requires: I28K RAM. onedisk drive. IX)S 2.0or later. 
In Short: DaiuPhis-H6. Version PC -86. offers a variety of data manipulation 
and repi^n features, hut its menus and prompts arc the real attraction for users 
new u> databases. NtX 
copy protected. 


DataPkis-PC 


CmCli 687 ON 
READER SERVCE CARD 


DalaPIu.s-86’.v</i;/a 
entry fields are 
predetermined. You 
van accept all field 
titles .shown, accept 
some of them, or 
create vour own. 


Rscord nuBker) 6601 
KacoH len|tk> IM13 
Tptal kacop^t) 6661 

nU iBBfth > I2$8 

nu Nuie >6: trig 

NMBk«P riBl4B> R 


Mpw Sc*t. 

CoBtiiwe ScBBBins 

talBct R«car4 1. . . . 

Uit R«cop4 

l•Hrlte UiteR Rkop 4. 
M4 Record To File. . . 
delete lecori 


23C22 

1'3 HF rWT6R 
Ii7.43 


The report generator’s record selection 
screen lets you specify criteria to limit re- 
cords included in a report. These limits in- 
clude wildcard character strings, exact 
character matches, and numbers less than, 
greater than, or equal to a number you 
choose. The report generator screen is also 
present in the mailing label feature, so that 
you can. for example, restrict the ZIP 
codes to which you send letters. The pack- 
age also includes the as yet undocumented 
ability to merge files into a word process- 
ing file. (The program's documentation 
should include a description of this new 
feature by the time this article is pub- 
lished.) With this feature, you can give 
DataPlus a letter and it will insert the ad- 
dresses automatically. 

In the memo window format, you can 
"paint" the position of your field titles and 
attach notes up to 1 ,000 characters long to 
records. The memo window can contain 
text and numbers and perform calcula- 
tions. You can even create a format in one 
record's window and call that format into 
another’s. Unfortunately, you must type in 
the memo window at aixtut hunt-and-peck 
speed. Type any faster, and the package 
loses characters. 


NO SHORT CUTS Although the menus 
and the prompts make all the program's 
features easy to use. they also make Dala- 
Plus-86 clunky. You can't skip to the fea- 
tures you want; instead you must respond 
to prompts for all features provided in a 
particular menu operation. The Quick 


■ In Dataplus-86' s memo 
window format, you can 
“paint” the position of 
your field titles and attach 
notes up to 1 ,000 charac- 
ters long to records. 

Scan and Super Scan features, however, 
compensate somewhat by allowing you to 
sprint to records in which one field con- 
tains characters that exactly match those 
you specify. Super Scan also lets you 
quickly add, delete, or edit records. 


The program's prompts can make the 
program cumbersome to use if you know 
what you're doing and want to speed 
through your tasks, but the Quick Scan and 
Super Scan features compensate for that to 
some extent. DataPlus^ is best for the 
person who cherishes ease of learning 
above all else. —Cheryl J. Goldberg 


FLEXIFILER 


Anyone who wants to maintain simple 
banks of information (mailing lists, forex- 
ample) in a straightforward and easy way 
will appreciate Flexifiler from Sound De- 
cisions. At $79 the database program is 
definitely well priced, and it is robust 
enough in its features to provide users with 
an adequate amount of control and flexibil- 
ity for many simple applications. 

The Flexifiler system comes on one 
disk and is very easy to install. It is not 
copy protected, and installation consists of 
copying three program flies to either a 
blank floppy or a hard disk. There are no 
configuration issues, and once installed the 
program is invoked by typing " flex” at the 
system prompt. 

Flexifiler features an uncomplicated 
step-by-step approach to accessing all of 
its functions, providing, in most cases, 
simple number or letter choices. An initial 
menu lists available database files, which 
can be recalled, deleted, or merged, and an 
option to create new files. Existing data- 
base files can be reorganized, and one file 
can be selectively merged with another. 
The merge option also allows you to divide 
a database file in two. 

Within this framework, once a database 
file has been established, records can be 
added, changed, or deleted, as well as 
searched for and displayed. Fields within a 
record can have a number of standard 
types. Welcome surprises are the inclusion 
of calculated fields and the ability to carry 
repeated data from record to record 
through a simple one-key process. 

Basic reports can be created through a 
built-in report generator, which will sort 
on up to three fields and report subtotals 
and totals on specified field breaks. The re- 
port generator will also allow you to send 
printer control codes to your printer, a 


PC MAGAZINE a AUGUST 1986 
280 



Make 

Flashy Programs. 


In dBASE, Turbo Pascal, BASIC, C, COBOL, Fortran, 1-2-3, DOS. 


Newl Flash-Up™ Windows. 

instantly flasti-up menus and help windows. 

From within almost ony program language or application program. When the user 
makes a menu selection, a sequence of keystrokes is sent to the running program os 
if the user were typing it at the keyboard, 

A keyboard macro utility that your programs can control! 

Just like keyboard macro utilities. Flash-Up Windows can be used to send 
repetitive keystrokes and simplify cammands for your users. 

But Flash-Up Windows con do more. Your programs can send commands directly 
to Flash-Up. Powerful commands that control when and how windows appear. 
Flash-Up is a perfect tool for controlling programs and entire systems via menus 
The powerful window editor allows you to create windows, change their size, 
location, and color - all automatically. 

Works with DOS. BASIC. Turbo Pascal, C. COBOL. Fortran. dBASE. 1-2-3. RrBASE 
... and most other sottwore. S90. 



Flash Code.™ For dBASE II, III and lll-i-. 



The most powerful, most complete program developer for dBASE II. III. and 111+ . 

Use Flash Code's advanced screen design editor and see how Incredibly easy 
screen design con be. Draw boxes, lines, and select colors. Specify special 
parameters for edit checking, initiol values, calculated fields, etc. Atl within one, 
easy to use editor. 

Then tell Flash Code to write the program. Based on your screen designs. Flash 
Code can generate a full database program. Well written code that you can use as 
is, or merge with your own programs 

Menus and help windows add a new dimension to your dBASE applications. 

Flash Code includes its own dBASE window editor. Use the window module to 
flash-up windows and screens instantly. The windows are easily converted when 
you move to the added power of our Flosh-Up Windows product. 

". . . 0 fru/y remarkable product. Brand new, slale-al-ine-arl and actually fun to use 
The winrhws make it an even more amazing product . ' 

— Gory N. Prague, Author, "The dBase III Programming Handbook" 

Flash Code. $150. 


Screen Sculptor.™ For IBM BASIC, Turbo Pascal, and Quick Basic. 




SDFTkUftRE 

BDTTUnC 

CDTlPRnV 


Create screens in minutes, then Screen Sculptor writes the program. 

In IBM BASIC, Turbo and Microsaft Pascal, and Quick Basic. Simply "draw" your 
screens with our advanced screen design editor and replace hours of tedious work 
with minutes of creative design. 

Move pieces of the screen around, select colors from a menu, draw boxes, lines, 
paint, repeat last character. And more! Specify variable names, data types, 
acceptable data ranges, pictures for edit checking, etc., and you're ready to go. 
Generate tested program source code to merge with your own program. 

Based on your screen design. The generated program floshes up the screen, 
allows data to be entered by the user, and edit checks the input data. 

'...so well done that you may not need to refer lo Ihe manual." 

". . . an exceptional product Ihat mis a real need in Ihe development of new programs. " 
— Computer Language 

Screen Sculptor. $125. 


Credit card orders call 24 hrs/day: 

1(S00) 824-7SSS, operator 26B. 

All other orders and Inquiries coll or write 
Soflwore Bottting Co., 6600 LI Expwy., 

Mospeth, NY 11378. 718-458-3700. 

Requires an IBM PC, XT, AT or true compatible. 256k. 

Not copy protected. 


No Risk Demo Offer! 

Order any pockoge and receive o 
seporotely seoled demo disk of the 
product. Use the demo onO the 
monuol lor 30 days. If you're not 
satisfied - for any reoson - 
return Ihe entire package lor o full 
refund. 


CIRCLE 530 ON READER SERVICE CARD 












The fastest C 


"four search for execution speed is over. 
The new Microsoft* C Compiler Version 4-0 
is here. With blazing performance. We’ve 
added common subexpression elimination 
to our optimizer that produces code that 
rips through the benchmarks faster than 
ever before. 

"... the Microsoft performance in the benchmarks 
for program execution is the best of the lot overall” 
—William Hunt, PC Tech Journal, January, 1986* 


But speed isn’t the only edge you get with 
Microsoft: C.Other advantages include a vari- 
ety of memory models like our new HUGE 
model that breaks the 64K limit on single 
data items. Plus our NEAR, FAR and HUGE 
pointers, which provide you greater flexibility. 
All this allows you to fine tune your program 
to be as small and fast as possible. 


“Excellent execution times, the fastest register 
sieve, and the best documentation in this review 
. . . Microsoft Corporation has produced a 
tremendously useful compiler.”— Christopher 
Skelly, Computer Languages, February, 1986. 


No more debugging hassles. 
Introducing CodeView. Free. 

Now, for a limited time, we’ll give you an 
unprecedented programming tool when you 
buy Microsoft C, free. New Microsoft Code- 
View^offers the most powerful tool yet in 



the war on C bugs. Forget the hex dumps. 
Now you can view and work with programs 
at any level you want. Use the program 
source, the disassembled object code, or 

Microsoft C Compiler Version 4*00 
Microsoft C Compiler 

* Produces fest executaUes and optimized code including elimination 
of common sub^pressions. NEW! 

* Implements register variables. 

• Small. Medium and Large Memory model libraries. 

* Compact and HUGE memory model libraries. NEW! 

• Can mix models with NEAR. FAR and the new HUGE pointers. 

* Transport source arid object code between MS-DOS* and XENIX* 
operating systenrs. 

♦ Library routines implement most of UNIX* System V C library 

* Start-up source code to help create ROMable code. NEW! 

♦ Full proposed ANSI C library support (except clock). NEW! 

• Large number of third party support l^raries available. 

• Choose from three math libraries and generate in-line 8087/80287 
mstructions or floating point calls: 

floating point emulator (utilizes 8087/80287 if installed). 

— 8087/80287 coprocessor support. 

— alwrtuite math package — extra speed without an 8087/80287. 

• Link your C routines with Microsoft FORTRAN (version 3.3 or 
higher), Microsoft Pascal (version 3.3 or hi^r) or Microsoft 
Macro Assembkr. 

* Microsoft Witidows support and MS-DOS 3.1 nerworkirtg support. 

* Si^ports MS-DOS pathnames ar>d iitput/output redirection. 

Microsoft Program Maintenance Utility; NEW! 

• Rebuilds your applications after your source flies have charged. 

* Supports macro deflnitions and inference rules. 

Other Utilities 

* Library Manager. 

• Object Code Linker. 

• EXE File Compression Utility. 

• EXE File Header Utility 

C Benchmarks 


Sieve of 
Eratosthenes 

Microsoft 

C4.0 

Lattice 

C 3.0 

Computer 

Imovation 

C 2.3 

Altec 
C86 3-2 

Wizard 
C 3.0 

(register) 

82.9 

!5i.4 

172.3 

68.0 

91.9 

Cc^ Block 

869 

231.7 

199.0 

123.8 

189.5 


Run on an IBM PC XT with 512K memory 


Microsoft CodeS^ew 

Window-oriented source-level debugger. NEW! 

• Watch the values of your local and ^obal variables and expressions 
as you debug. 

• Set conditional breakpoints on variables, expressioru or memory: 
trace artd single step. 

• Watch CPU registers and flags as you execute. 

• Efliectively uses up to four wirtdows. 

• Debug using your origirtal source code, the resuliir^ disassembly 
or both intermii^ed. 

• Use dropdown menus to execute CodeView commaids. 

• Access the on-lirte help to lead you dirough CodeView 's options 
and settings. 

« Easily deb^ graidiics-oriented programs smce program output is 
kept separate frtxn debi^ger output. 

• Keyboard or optional mouse support. 

• Enter in familiar SYMDEB or DEBUG commands. 


*Repnnced from PC Tech JoumoL Jinuary 1966, copyri^t 1966. ZifT-Davu Publishing 


youve ever seen. 





1 Calls 1 



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00 00 00 43 


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CALL 

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CALL 

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IP = 00F8 

‘:DB5 0101 

83C402 

ADD 

SP,*02 


novrf lou 

15: 

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up 

3DB5:eUM 

E84Dee 

CALL 

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IBM 

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positive 

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not zero 

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do { 



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both at the same time. C^en a window to 
view CPU registers and flags. Watch local 
and global variables as welT All while your 
program is running. 

CodeView gives you complete control. 
Trace execution a line at a time— using 
source or assembly code. Or set conditional 
breakpoints on variables, memory or expres- 
sions. CodeView supports the familiar 
SYMDEB command syntax, as you’d expect. 
Commands are also available through arop- 
down menus. Combine the new window- 
oriented interface with our on-line help and 
debugging has never been easier. Or quicker. 


Take the $5 CodeView tour. 

Itbu may find it hard to believe our debug- 
ger can do all we’ve claimed. So were offering 
test drives. Five bucks will put you behind 
the wheel of a Microsoft C demo disk with 
CodeView. See for yourself how fast debug- 
ging can get. 

R)r more information about the Code- 
View demo disk, the new Microsoft C 
Compiler, a list of third party library sup- 
port or the name of your nearest Nhcrosoft 
dealer, call (800) 426-9400. In Washington 
State and Alaska, (206) 882-8088. In Canada 
call (416) 673-7638. 


Microsoft’ C Compiler 

The High Performance Software 

Microtofi. MS-DOS and XENIX are rcglatcrcd iradnnariu and CodeView b a trademark of MicrtMofi Corporation UNIX b a 
trademark of AT&T BeD Laboramrie* IBM b a regbtercd trademark of Incemacional Btwneu Machmes Corporation. 



■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


F A C V I- I 1. f; 


Fkxifiler, Version 1.0 
Sound Decisions 

19925 Slovens Creek Blvd.. # IM; Cupertino, CA 95014; (408| 97.V7864 
LislPrice:$79 Requires: 12SK RAM. iwodisk drives. DOS I.Oorlaier. 
In Short: Althtuiph its lack of indexing and importing features makes il inap. 
propriatc for most business uses. FltxifiUr is a simple, uncomplicated database 
that provides users with 
all the basic features. Not 
a>py prirtecled. 



The suimtarcl 
FkxiSikr Jala-file 
defimuon screen asks 
that you verify the 
information before the 
program accepts your 
field descriptions . 



valuable feature. In addition, Flexifiler lets 
you save report formats for future use. 

SIMPLE BUT LIMITED Simplicity al- 
ways has a price. In Flexifiler's case, a 
number of limitations make the system un- 
suitable for many projects. There is no 
ability to set up indexes, and sorting can be 
accomplished only when creating a report; 
therefore, searching a relatively large data- 
base can be a time-consuming task. The 
report generator, while easy to use, is lim- 
ited in its formatting capabilities. 

The greatest drawback to using Flexi- 
ftler, however, is its complete inability to 
import or export data of any kind, includ- 
ing ASCII files. Data can be input only 
from the keyboard. The lack of import or 
export capabilities has obvious implica- 
tions for users whose applications require 
mail-merge capabilities. 

NO SURPRISES Flexifiler works ex- 
actly the way it’s supposed to work. The 
manual is accurate and clear and includes 
suitable examples that will allow anyone to 
get the system tunning in a matter of min- 
utes. Though somewhat limited in func- 
tionality, Flexifiler can be praised for the 


well-behaved manner in which it works. 
While almost any database system will 
provide the services Flexifiler provides, 
very few can provide them with so few 
complications. — Tony Rizzo 


FORM MANAGER 

Form Manager's strong suit is creating on- 
screen versions of paper forms. Its typical 
uses are creating and maintaining custom- 
er lists, invoices, sales orders, budgets, 
and expense reports. Once you create the 
form and associated data file, the pro- 
gram's ability to draw lines and boxes on 
the .screen and its flexible field definitions 
make data entry easy. Form Manager also 
has an extensive facility for calculating 
formulas on-screen. 

Bfr Software’s Form Manager pack- 
age includes four components: Forms Edi- 
tor, with which you design and change 
forms; Data File Create, with which you 
create or set up your data file; Data File 
Manager, which is for data entry, retriev- 
al, and calculation; and the optional Report 
Writer, which summarizes and prints in- 


formation in your data file. 

Defining an input form is easy. Using 
the Forms Editor, you simply move 
around the screen and type in field labels 
anywhere you want them, k la PFStFile. If 
you want to be mote fancy. Form Manag- 
er makes it fairly simple to draw boxes 
around and lines within identified parts of 
the screen. 

Actually defining the fields is a bit more 
complicated, requiring you to mark the be- 
ginning and ending points of each field and 
then to fill in or accept the defaults of a 
very functional field definition screen. 
You can choose from nine data types; set 
ranges, defaults, and other automatic en- 
try-checking facilities; and specify screen 
attributes such as reverse video or blinking 
text. 

DATA FILE MANAGEMENT Once 
you’ve defined one or more forms, you 
then use the Data File Manager part of the 
package. You use this program to retrieve 
a data file for entering or changing data, 
searching for a record, reviewing or updat- 
ing records, defining formulas, and calcu- 
lating or executing macros or formulas in- 
teractively. Using the Data File Manager, 
you can choose up to ten forms or pages 
per file. You can later reuse individually 
defined forms, or pages, for different 
files — a very useful facility. While choos- 
ing forms for the datafile, you can also in- 
dicate up to ten fields as index fields, 
which will be continuously updated. 

The last step in getting your file ready 
for data entry is to put in any desired for- 
mulas. Form Manager's math capabilities 
include several built-in math and trigono- 
metric and statistical functions, as well as a 
macro capability for repeating formulas. 

Data entry, updating, and editing take 
place within the Data File Manager. Form 
Manager uses the PC’s function keys and 
Alt key combinations extensively; two 
templates come with the program. 

REPORTING Report design with Form 
Manager is limited to columnar and label 
formats. In each case a series of questions 
leads you through report definition. You 
are required to indicate field names and the 
page column number where each field will 
start printing; I found the process some- 
what tedious. BIT Software sells the op- 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
284 



Some irresistible reasons to buy Revelation* 
before any other netuiork database: 




Network 

dBASF III 

R:base 5000 


Revelation 

PLUS' 

Multi-User" 

1 Product Features: 




1 Maximum Characters per Record 

65,000 

4,000 

1.530 

1 Maximum Fields per Record 

65,000 

128 

400 

1 Maximum Files per Database 

Unlimited 

Unlimited 

40 

1 Variable-Length F'ields 

• 



1 Multi-Value Fields 

• 



1 Programmable Data Dictionary 

1 Network Operating Systems Supporte<l: 

• 



1 IBM* PC Network 

• 

• 

• 

3COM EtherSeries- (2.4/3-I-) 

• 

• 

• 

Nestar Plan 3000/4000 

• 



All Versions of Novell NetWare™ 

• 



Tapestry 

• 



Alloy NTNX 

• 



Networking Features: 




Full Record Locking During Relational 
Operations 

• 


• 

Application Generator Automatically 
Creates Locking Statements 

Network DBMS Can Span Multiple 

• 



Volumes or File Servers 

• 



Network Run-Time Module 

• 



Minicomputer Oimmunications' 

• 



1) Fmm ongtnal manafoclarrt 







V • 

V* 





These are just a few reasons why 
Network Revelation is the leading data- 
base applications environment for local 
area networks. 

That’s because only Network 
Revelation has the tools to create applica- 
tions worth sharing. 

Like a program generator that builds 
locking statements, automatically, so you 
don't have to; a fourth-generation query 
language and report writer; plus a robust 
version of BASIC with a high-speed 
compiler. 

And unlike single-user databases 
pretending to run on networks. Network 
Revelation doesn't lock everyone out 
during routine sorts, joins, and math 
operations. 

Sample the power of Revelation. 
$24.95 gets you a comprehensive Demo/ 
Tutorial. A phone call gets you complete 
information. 


COSMOS 


Cosmos. Inc., 19530 Pacific Highway S.. 
SeatUe.WA 98188 (206) 824-9942, 
Telex 9103808627 


tHM u a rrgiUrrrd IntlemaHt tf tmlrmaliomil Bunmm Marknut 
CitrpunilHm SrlWamsalratlfmartofStit^O.lnr litkrrStrtrs u 
alTadcmaftndCOM Ctirpmalnm dbw III PH 'Suarrgateirdtndt 
marko/ Aikbm Tair k.biattSOlkiualraJfaiarkefkttmnm. Im 


CIRCLE 218 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


THE VERY THOUGHT OF 
NETWORKING WITH A 
WIMPY DATABASE 
TERRIFIES ME,EPNA. 


■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


■ Form Manager make's, 
it fairly simple to draw 
boxes around and lines 
within identified parts of 
the screen. 


tional Report Writer program for more 
complicated reporting. 

Reporting aside. Form Manager's 
pieces are fairly easy to use and powerful. 
The program is marred, however, by a dif- 
ficult manual. 1 found moving between 
various program components confusing at 
times, and the organization of the manual 
did little to help. The manual has no index, 
and I often found the information I needed 
only after more searching than should be 
necessary. In addition, the manual's tutori- 
al is disjointed. The on-disk tutorial is 
much better, but it’s not interactive — you 
just sit and watch. 


Form Manager is a very flexible on- 
screen form-emulation program with pow- 
erful design and calculation features, but it 
could stand significant improvement in its 
manual and more flexibility in report writ- 
ing. — Bruce Brown 


FRAMEWORK n 


The database module of Ashton-Tate’s 
Framework II is a fast, flexible file manag- 
er. With Framework ll’s five other mod- 
ules — word processing, spreadsheet, 
graphics, forms processing, and outline 
generator — it forms an integrated software 
package that retails for $695. 

Framework 11 loads an entire database 
file into memory, which accounts for its 
speed. The maximum capacity of a file in a 
640K-byte system, however, is approxi- 
mately 1 ,000 records of ten ten-character 
fields. If any other frames (frames are sim- 
ilar to windows, except that frames can 
contain other frames), such as a word pro- 
cessing or spreadsheet frame, are open, 
even this capacity is diminished. For larger 
database files a virtual-memory configura- 


tion option lets you use extended memory 
or a hard disk. However, this option slows 
the database manager consider^ly in such 
basic functions as copying or deleting re- 
cords. 

To create a database frame, you first 
choose the Database option from the Cre- 
ate menu. A blank (fame opens with a de- 
fault size of 50 fields by 100 records. Fteld 
names are entered as column headings 
along the top row of a table, which looks 
very much like a standard spreadsheet ex- 
cept that there are no letter^ colutims or 
numbered rows. Once you enter the field 
names, you can then change the view. 
Pressing the FIO key shows you a Frame- 
work //-generated input form. You can 
change the size of the input areas, which 
are actually small frames, and move them 
around the screen to create a custom input 
form. One more press of FIO gives you a 
dBASE mill input form. 

The program has a quirk relating to data 
input. To differentiate number fields from 
character fields when the input is ambigu- 
ous — a phone number, for example — you 
must first enter a space. This lets the pro- 
gram know that the number you are about 
to enter is the start of a character field. The 
program doesn’t allow you to define the 
field type any other way. 

Fast sorts Sorts on any field are 
lighming fast, less than half a second for 
the 25-name list in the PC Magazine Labs 
tests. Although only a single-level sort is 
available on the menu, other features of the 
program such as selecting and sotting on 
subsets of the file let you circumvent ob- 
stacles like this. Breakpoints are not fea- 
tured on the menu, but you can produce 
them on reports by deleting duplicate en- 
tries from the appropriate field. Frame- 
work II can easily rearrange fields in the ta- 
ble, so you’re not restricted when defining 
the look of the report. 

Framework II slows down when con- 
structing a calculated field. One field that 
calculated a salary bonus took 1 1 seconds 
for 25 calculations. The same calculation 
took 2 seconds in the spreadsheet. 

Framework II automatically loads im- 
ported ASCII files into a word frame. You 
must then copy this information into the 
database frame; doing so takes only a few 
keystrokes. 


FACT F I L K 


Form Manager, Version 3.3 
BIT Software liK. 

P.O. Box 360^19; Milpitas, CA 93033; (408) 942-t087; (408) 262-t034 
list Price: $195 Requires: 2S^RAM.twodiskdrives. DOS2.1 orlater. 
In Short: This flat-file package has powerful forms design and formula calcu- 
lation features, but it ne^ better documentation and more reporting flexibility. 
Not copy prot e cted. 



CfRCtXtMON 
HEAOen SERVICE OflD 


When defining an 
individual field in 
Form Manager, you 
can select from an 
easy-to-read menu 
screen that presents 
all possible field 
types, automatic 
features, and screen 
attributes. 






■Vi 

I's? 01 



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F 10 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
286 








You’ve worked hard choosing the 
best strategy and practicing your test 
words. A presentation is not the time to 
realize your graphics are second-rate. 

Harvard” Presentation Graphics 
( HPG) gives you the confidence of 
having the test and the brightest in 
your corner. It lets you choose from 
the most complete selection of text, 
organization charts and graphs in a 
single software package. 

HPG’s features speak for them- 
selves. And for you. 


Most Complete Selection 
of Charts 


Maximnm Customization. HPG 

offers more ways to enhance your 
graphics. It lets you make your point 
with distinction. 

• unlimited text sizes 

• 17 font styles • 16 colors 
•3-D capabilities 

• lines, arrows, boxes, and text 
notation 


Hipest Quality Output. HPG 

delivers the highest possible resolu- 
tion from your IBM PC or peripheral. 
Its custom designed fonts ensure 
maximum readability and a profes- 
sional look only graphic artists 
can match. 


HPG vs. a Competitor 


WW 


Widest VarietyofMedia. HPG's 
superior output quality can make 
you look good in more places, in more 
ways, through the widest selection 
of output options. 

• printers • plotters • overheads 
•35mm slides •PC 


Most Direct and Powerful Lotus 
Interface. Me any spreadsheet 
data you’ve created with Lotus 1-2-37 
HPG will read it directly and imme- 
diately transform it into a dazzling 
graph you can be proud of. 

Faster to Learn— Faster to Use. 
HPG is designed for business-people 
with quick turnaround times. You get 
better control over your charts and 
can even do last-minute editing. 

• intuitive menu 

• default formats 

• supports fastest speed available on 
printer/plotter-up to twice as fast 
as other programs 

• batch printing or plotting 

Harvard Presentation Graphics 
-the best and the brightest. Let the 
superlatives rub off on you. 


Graduate to 
Harvard Presentation 

Runson IBM PC.Cotnpaq, ATftTl^iiciy.aiKl other com latlbleMS DOScotnputerK A product Software PiilHishifvtCofpdraUon.RQ. Box 721U.ML 


GRCLE 296 ON READER SERVICE CARD 





■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


ADDED POWER Framework IFs inte- 
grated nature gives the database module 
added power in many areas. For example, 
you can create graphs from database infor- 
mation. link spreadsheets and databases 
dynamically, and print reports in a variety 
of type styles, including headers and foot- 
ers. In addition, you can use the word 
frames and the database frames together to 
create form letters and mailing labels. 

To top everything off. Framework II 
supports abbreviations and macros and in- 
cludes a programming language, FRED. 
Abbreviations are two- or three-letter com- 
mands followed by Alt-Backspace that 
will bring up a longer string of text. Mac- 
ros ate formulas or sequences of com- 
mands that can be invoked by pressing a 
two-key sequence. FRED can be used to 
design customized databases. 

Framework ll's database module per- 
formed quite well on the PC Labs tests. 1 
especially liked how it created reports ex- 
actly the way 1 wanted them to look (albeit 
not with dedicated commands). Many 
standalone file managers restrict your flex- 
ibility in report generation. 

Framework II is not likely to be the 
right product for you if your database files 


are several thousand records long. But if 
your files usually don’t exceed several 
hundred records and you need mote than 
just a standalone databa.se, 1 highly recom- 
mend Framework II. — ^Joe Desposito 


GOLDENGATE 

Goldengaie, from Cullinet PC Software, is 
one of the major players in the integrated 
software arena. Cullinet, widely known 
for its mainframe software, has used its ex- 
perience to produce a first-rate package for 
the personal computer user. 

The entire program takes up a substan- 
tial amount of space, and it would be unre- 
alistic to consider using anything other 
than a hard disk for operation. Installation 
is not difficult. Cullinet uses an interesting 
setup: once the program is installed on the 
hard disk, all program files are hidden 
from view. A Dir command reveals only 
the small (jG.COM file. Entering GG at 
the system prompt brings up the main Gol- 
den gate screen, which prompts for a user 
password. The proper password then leads 
to the full options menu. 


VARIATION ON LOTUS Since Gold- 
engate uses a variation on the Lotus com- 
mand structure, 1-2-3 and Symphony users 
would feel completely at home using the 
software. Program modules, which Cul- 
linet calls tools, can be chosen from the 
main menu or called from any other mod- 
ule. Database information can easily be 
transferred to Goldengate's other mod- 
ules. 

The database is based on the spread- 
sheet model; in fact, it is in reality a spread- 
sheet. Data is organized in rows and col- 
umns, and you must work within such a 
framework for all database tasks. 

The system provides a useful collection 
of features. Most interesting is Golden- 
gate's ability to link data from more than 
one data file through a common field. Cul- 
linet calls a display of data a view. 

Goldengate links different data files 
and presents a view of the resulting data as 
defined by the user. This ability borders on 
the typical relational abilities of Category 2 
produets and is a welcome feature. Gol- 
dengate even provides a Select command, 
which is used to search for data based on 
user-defined criteria. 

Goldengate will sort information based 
on one or more column values, in ascend- 
ing or descending order. Unfortunately, it 
has no indexing capability; you must rely 
heavily on sorting to keep performance at 
an adequate level, which involves you too 
intimately for my taste with the mainte- 
nance of data files. Indexing would pro- 
vide a substantial improvement to data ac- 
cess. 

CREATING A VIEW Reports are com- 
pletely linked to views. You must first de- 
termine what data files you need and then 
sort and link those data files to create a 
view. Once the view is created you can 
print it. 

Reports can provide a relatively sophis- 
ticated collection of data because of Gol- 
dengate's ability to relate and link data 
files. In another sense, the reports are lim- 
ited in that they are simply printed versions 
of the view. 

The database by itself lacks most of the 
report-writer features found in most true 
database managers. However, by using 
Goldengate’s edit tool, you can probably 
produce more-substantial reports. This 


, \ c I 1- 1 1. ! ■: 


Framework II, Version 1 .0 
Ashlon-Tate 

20101 Haniilum Ave.iToirance. CA 90502-1319; (213) 329-8000 
ELsl Price: S695 Requires: 384K RAM, iwo disk ckives, DOS 2.0i>r laier. 
In Short: This fast, flexible database, integrated with five other applications 
nHxlules, creates reports the way you want them to Uxik. and its integrated na- 
ture gives yi>u added 
pow-cr and tlcxibilily. 

Copy protected. 

CiKLE 693 ON 
READER SERVICE CARO 


Framewort: ll’s 
Juuihast’ nuHluU', 
Ikised on a standard 
spreadsheet, lets you 
select commands from 
pulldown menus. The 
.status line, on the 
lower part of the 
.screen, acknowledges 
frame and file 
Unation. 


GfcTTlSt'. STAKTin 
f-RAME>Xt.lRk II 



Finil My sptcifitd mi 9 or phroso - in tny type of frMO 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
288 





Our guarantee 
is useless. 


Our monitors are engineered to give you trouble-free 
performance for years. And while every Tatung 
monitor comes with a guarantee, we’re 
confident that’s the one feature you’ll 
never have to use. Write, or call 
toll free, for complete 
information about 
Tatung Monitors. 

We’ll respond quickly. 

Guaranteed. 


This is the Tatung CM1380 
a 13"RrGgBbl Super High 
Resolution monitor. It 
features a 64 color display 
with 640 X 350 lines of 
resolution: 22KHz/15KHz 
dual frequency. 


OTKTUNG 


Tatung Co. of America, Inc., 2850 El Presidio St.. Long Beach. CA 90810 Toll Free: 1-800-421-2929 (Outside CA)/(213) 979-7055 (In CA) 
In Northern CA Call: Tatung Science and Technology. Inc., 708 Charcot Ave.. San Jose. CA 95131 (408) 435-0140 
Tatung Co. of America. Inc. is a subsidiary of Tatung Co.. Taipei. R.O.C. 




■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


nr.; 


I- A C 1' I- 


L H 


Goldengate, Version 1.2 
Cullint’i Software Inc. 

400 Blue Hill Dr.; Westwood. MA 02090; (800) 321-1095; (617) 329-7700 
List Price: S695 Requires: 384K RAM, two disk drives. DOS 2.0 or later. 
In Short: database mcxlule combines relative ease of use and 

good performance in a well-integrated envinmmcnl. An interesting feature is its 
ability to link data from 
more than one data file. 

Copy protected. 


GOLDENGATE 

CXiIbn< PC Siibvw 


CIRCLE 669 ON 
REAE>ER SERVICE CARD 


Goldengate ‘.V main 
opiio/is menu lists 
the seven available 
UH)ls that you can 
select with its I -2-3- 
like comnuuul Ixir. 


Info-nscr 

.t't-ii. erncif l.i 

Ncce-sSs. organize-, ani Mintams folaer- arid obi:9c:s 

Eii; 

Creates, displays, forinats, ard prints docuiwnts 

fpr-tsoshest 

Creates and exet/.es financial and statistical irodsls 


Creates displays and updates relational data tables 


MaiS graphs and periorris statistical functions 

Profile 

jets sgsteTrwide options a'd de-Tce configurations 

Effula^or 

Connects the PC to the rr.a:nfraTe via terwnal e'wlaticn 

raw 

Spreaisheet latsbafe 'Sraph Profile EMator Ms 


still requires a bit of work on your part. 

Goldengate is not inexpensive and can- 
not be recommended simply for its data- 
base. In the integrated software market, 
however, Goldengate should be given 
careful consideration. Its relational ability 
may give it an edge over similar prod- 
ucts. — Tony Rizzo 


INFOSTAR PLUS 


InfoStar Plus, a file manager and report 
generator from MicroPro International, 
has some outstanding features. The pro- 
gram consists of IrfoStar, a tutorial, and 
Starburst, which is a menu-generating pro- 
gram used to develop turnkey database 
systems. 

When you bring up InfoStar, a menu 
(the type that you can create with Star- 
burst) with five choices appears. After you 
select appropriate choices from first- and 
second-level menus, you can begin to de- 
velop a file input form by entering infor- 
mation on a blank screen. You denote in- 
put fields by typing the underline character 
a specified number of times to establish 


field width. 

One problem you encounter when you 
create a form is that you need to use Ctrl 
key sequences to navigate around the 
screen — the cursor keys are disabled. 

SOPHISTICATED PROCEDURES 

After you’ve created an input form, you 
must choose a key field. Then you may as- 
sign attributes to any of the fields. This fea- 
ture allows for sophisticated data entry 
procedures and error checking. The file- 
access attribute, for example, relates a 
field from one file to data in another file. 
Suppose customer number is included as 
one of the fields on a form or record. You 
can link this field to another file that has 
customer number, name, and address. 
When you enter the customer number on 
the form, the name and the address of the 
customer from the other file are automati- 
cally input into appropriate fields on the 
current form. 

One of the more-sophisticated error- 
checking attributes is called file verify. 
Here you may enter a state abbreviation 
such as NY in a State field. If you have as- 
signed a file verify attribute to the field, In- 
foStar will automatically check your entry 


against a file that has state abbreviations. 
To keep track of any attributes you may 
have assigned to fields in a record, you can 
print them out. 

Help screens ate ubiquitous in InfoStar, 
normally occupying the upper third of the 
screen. And they ate needed, too, at least 
until you become very familiar with the 
product, because most commands ate con- 


■ When you create a 
form in InfoStar Plus, 
you need to use Control 
key sequences to 
navigate around the 
screen — ^the cursor keys 
are disabled. 

trol key commands. 

Some of InfoStar's menu selections, 
commands, and modes are not as clear or 
intuitive as they could be. If you want to 
search for a record, for example, you se- 
lect Enter Data from the menu. Then once 
the form appears, you select “edit Scan 
mask” to conduct your record search. In 
other parts of the program, you select a 
command that says “Save form and boot 
operating system,” which actually returns 
you to the menu from which you started. 
Luckily, these examples are not typical of 
all the selections you make with Info- 
Star. 

TWO KINDS OF REPORTS The ptx)- 
gtam can generate two kinds of reports: the 
quick report and the custom report. With 
the quick report, InfoStar does most of the 
work; with the custom report, you paint a 
layout on the screen and embed somewhat 
cryptic commands similar to the dot com- 
mands WordlSraruses. 

In one sense, the report generator, like 
the file manager part of the program, has 
sophisticated capabilities. It can generate 
reports with fields from more than one file, 
for example. But when I tried to generate a 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
290 



Pickacard 

and^t^MP® 


d j 




Putting your money on a 
Hercules- Graphics Card or a 
Hercules Color Card has 
always been a safe bet. 

After all, Hercules is 
the industry standard in 
high resolution graphics 
hardware. And we back 
each of our cards with a 
full two-year warranty. 

Which explains why we’ve already 
sold more than 500,000 cards to owners of 
IBM* PCs, XTs, ATs and many compatibles. 

But there are still some people out there who 
have yet to buy a Hercules card. 

So we’re sweetening the pot. 

Between now and August 31, when you buy a 
Hercules Graphics Card or a Hercules Color Card, 


we’ll send you a check for $50.00. 
See your local Hercules 
dealer. When you’ve made your 
best deal, ask him for one of 
our rebate applications and 
send it in with your 
Purchaser Registration 
^ dated sales 




receipt. 

We’ll pay off in short order. 
Your Hercules card, on the other 
hand, will pay off for a lot longer than that. 


HERCULES 

GrapNcsCard I ColorCard 



Hercules^ Wre strong on graphics. 


Trademarks/Owners: [fercules/Hercules Computer Technology; IBM/IBM. Offer valid in the United States. U.S. Territories and Canada hnm Mav 1 throu^ August 31. 
1986. Rebate application, accompanied by Purchaser Registration Card and dated sales receipt must be sent to Hercules Rebate Offer, PROMARK Depot. PO. 3947. 
Milford, CT 0^61-0397 no later than September 15. 19^. Applications received after that date will not be honored. Rebate will be paid in the same currency in which the 
card was purchased OBer void where prohibited, taxed or restricted. Dealers are not eligible to claim rebate. Offer limited to one rebate per product serial number and 
original Purchaser Registration Card Each rebate must be applied for on an individual basis. Other application constitutes fraud. Rebate offer applies to Hercules Graphics 
Card (model GB102) and Hercules Color Card (model GB2(X)). Other Hercules products are not eligible. Allow 6-8 weeks for redemption. For aMitional infonnation in 
the United States call (800) 532-0600 ext. 700. In Canada call (800) 323-0601 ext. 700. 


CIRCLE 140 ON READER SERVICE CARD 







■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


F A c r F I L [ ■: 


InfoStar Plus^ Version 1.16 
MicmPri) Intenwiional Corp, 

3255 Brtxierick Si., #17; San Francisco. CA 94123; (415) 382-108{) 

LLsI Price; S295 Requires: 96K R.AM. two disk drives, DOS 2.0 or later. 
In Short: !VlicroPros file manager and report generator has some outstanding 
hencilts. notably its handy cmir'ClK’cking feature and a nifty filc-acces-s feature, 
but it sometimes fulls 
short of expectations. An 
unusual component is its 
menu-generating utility. 

Sunburst. Not copy pro- 
tected. 



InfoStar Plu.s’^ rather 
simpHstii- main 
menu is rypU al of 
menus that can /v 
created with the 
Slarhiirst utility. 



tar + 


1 Forni- 1 Ikata 

2 Reports 

2 Sorting 

4 Systrn BuiUing 

T Htlp 


isFO i or H ari press FlTUlfn 


Choice 

WWinTPU 


simple report that had breakpoints done a 
certain way. the quick report feature 
couldn't handle it, and the custom report 
feature did so only with some difficulty on 
my part. 

You can learn the program by using ei- 
ther the printed or the disk-based tutorial. 
Though both are good, I preferred to use 
the clear, well-written, and nicely illustrat- 
ed printed tutorial. 

Although InfoStar Plus is a quite so- 
phisticated file manager, it doesn't always 
take full advantage of the capabilities of 
the machine that’s running it. Potential us- 
ers should be ready to live with InfoStar 
Plus's occasional limitations as well as its 
benefits. — Joe Desposito 


PALANTIR FILER 


If you have a mouse on your desk and Mi- 
crosoft Windows on your hard disk, you 
may want to add Palantir Filer to your of- 
fice arsenal. Palantir Filer is a menu-driv- 
en. flat-file database manager whose main 
distinction is that it runs under Microsoft 
Witulows. 


■ Palantir Filer works 
exclusively through the 
screen-painted forms, or 
templates, that you set up 
for data entry. 


A DOS version is available that runs a 
trifle faster than the Windows version, but 
it lacks a few of the features that make the 
Wirulows version easier to work with. Tim 
Fanell, one of the program’s authors, says 
that Palantir Inc. is concentrating its mar- 
keting efforts on the Windows version and 
has no plans to update the DOS version. 
Palantir also offers a version that comes 
with a run-time copy of Windows on four 
floppy disks. 

■The Windows version smoothly imple- 
ments the Windows interface, and, like 
Windows, works best with a mouse. If you 
don’t harbor rodents, you can use a combi- 


nation of function keys, Ctrl-letter combi- 
nations, and cursor highlighting to enter 
commands, summon drop-down menus, 
and choose menu options. In the DOS ver- 
sion, which has submenus instead of drop- 
down menus, you can use cursor high- 
lighting, function keys, and the first letters 
of menu choices. 

Palantir Filer works exclusively 
through the screen-painted forms, or tem- 
plates . that you set up for data entry . Once 
you load your data into the form, the form 
and the file become one entity that you can 
use to perform quick multilevel searches 
using Boolean logic, create multiple in- 
dexes, and generate reports. But before 
you can get a report, you must design a re- 
port form. 

In addition to Character. Numeric, In- 
teger, Calculated, and Floating-Point 
fields, a Palantir Filer form can include 
right-justified, read-only, and invisible 
field types. Form design is quick, easy, 
and straightforward once you figure out 
how to do it. However, although the nicely 
printed loose-leaf manual is fairly well 
written and has some helpful examples, it 
doesn’t make the procedure for defining 
field types — and particularly for adding 
headers and footers to reports — as clear as 
it should. A good tutorial would mend 
matters considerably. 

A MURKY MANUAL The manual, in 
fact, is Palantir Filer's most glaring weak- 
ness. It has step-by-step explanations of all 
major functions, an index, a table of con- 
tents, and several appendixes — but no de- 
scription whatsoever, in either version, of 
how to use the interface. Windows users, I 
suppose, might be expected to learn the 
ropes from the Windows manual, but ev- 
eryone else is left in the lurch. Where the 
interface is explained, the explanation is 
murky. For example, the only mention of 
the function keys, which are essential for 
editing records and forms, is buried in an 
appendix of the DOS version's manual. 
Tlie manual uses only Palantir’s own func- 
tion key names: to find out which PC func- 
tion keys correspond to these names, you 
need the program’s plastic keyboard tem- 
plate — which did not come with my first 
review copy. 

Farrell says that Palantir is revamping 
the manual completely for its upcoming 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
292 






SPECTACULAR! 

DESK-TOP COLOR & GRAPHICS 



EGA Monitor and Card Package 




While other manufacturers have been rushing into the marketplace with their 
EGA products, our /ntematlona/ Graphics Division has been assembling the 
finest, full featured. EGA package available on the market today 
This package includes a high quality MITSUBISHI 14' EGA/CGA Color Display 
Monitor and our unique INTERCRAPH-Plus4 EGA halford. an American-made 
Enhanced Graphics Adaptor, which supports EGA. CGA. HCC and MCA modes 
An introductory price of $895.00 is available now Suggested retail price is 
S 1 19$ 00. including our $-year limited warranty 
UNSURPASSED SYSTEM COMPATIBIUTY — Fully IBM PC. XT and AT 
compatible Note: Unlike many EGA card packages, our product also runs on most 
IBM compatibles that are not 100% IBM "bios'’ compatible REFER TO CHART 
IMTPPf^PADI-l maintain your software UBRARY — The 
UN I LIx\JlW~l 1 INTERCRAPH-Plus4 half<ard is 4-way compatible 
with EGA. CCA. MGA and HCC and is made and 
supported in America 


P(us4 


Amttsubishi 


The INTERCRAPH-Plus4 runs ail major IBM compatible software packages 
WITHOUT ANY SOFTWARE BOOT — eliminating the extra step of using a boot 
diskette Compatible with Flight Simulator. Pin Ball; let. Lotus 1-2-$ and 
Symphony: AutoCad; Microsoft Windows; lECAl IBM Drawing Assistant. CEM Draw. 
Dr Halo. PC Paintbrush; EGA f^int and many more Complete with 2 video jacks. 
2$6K of display memory and light pen connector; with up to 720 x $46 res. in 
nxonochrome and 640 x $$0 res in EGA mode 
YOUR GRAPHICS DISPLAYED CRISP AND 
CLEAR by MITSUBISHI, the v^d's largest supplier 
of high quality video products, emphasizing quality and reliability Under testing. 
MITSUBISHI'S CRTs lasted 2Vj times longer than the industry s average The 14' 
EGA/CGA Color Display Monitor's long list of features include a true 16 shades of 
grey, non-glare screen and infinitely adjustable tilt and swtvel stand lopt.l. TTL 
interface. 640 x 200 res. at l$.7$ khz in CCA mode; keyboard switchable to 640 x $$0 
res at 22 khz in EGA mode The larger 14'screenhasafull 1$' of viewable work area 
with super high contrast graphics and characters. 

International Graphics 

Division of Kellie Industries 
2$I42 Alcalde. Laguna Hills. 

California 926$$ 
l-800-4$$.$$4$ 

Telex $I06013$42 
FAX 1714) $81-4872 

Discounts for corporate 
purchases. 




276 OhJ READER SERVICE CARD 


4-\h^ Compatible 








■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


M 


F A C' T F I 1. K 


Palantir Filer. Version 2.0 
Pulantir Software 

12777 Jones Rd.. #100; HouMon. TX 77070; (8(K)) 368-3797; 
(H0())83l-3l!9in Texas 

List Price: $145 Requires: 512K RAM. onedisk drive. DOS 1.1 orlaler. 
In Short: Palantir Filer is an easy-to-use. efficient flat-file system that comes 
in two versitKis. one of 


iMMm 


which runs under Micro- 
.uffi Windows. Ni)t copy 
protected. 


Palantir Filer uses 
screen-painted data 
entry forms. The 
Micnisoft Windows 
menu appears at the 
top of the screen, and 
an arrow marks the 
mou.se po.sition. 


Filir - PCEnPLOV.SCP 


blit Serffn Find WfconI Rtport H)8 Options WindBK unctl 


I HBIimt liniiq: 


Nik taiFM 


K EwloytF List 
inifinl 


Udnss III Ctitrt Piri til 
City Luciln 


Stitt HI ZIP nsiz 


Eivloytt nuubtr 111131 Dtpirtwnt tim Mirittiny 
Slliry SKII.M [i 



new version. The update will be free to 
registered users, but Palantir will charge a 
small handling fee for the new manual. 
According to Farrell, the new version will 
expand Palantir Filer's file-import op- 
tions, Currently, Palantir Filer can import 
only files that ate in its own format. The 
new version will be able to import stan- 
dard, comma-delimited ASCII files and 
make direct use of dBASE // and /// files. 

DOS VERSION The DOS version, 
which 1 used for the PC Magazine Labs 
benchmark-test timings, has a few rough 
spots that Palantir has polished smooth in 
the Windows version. It requires special file- 
name extensions; without them it won't 
recognize the file or save changes to exist- 
ing files. The Windows version handles 
these extensions automatically. Also, the 
DOS version gives you no directory listing 
for your forms and data files; to find out 
what you have, you must exit to DOS. The 
Windows version gives you a list of avail- 
able files to select from. In the DOS ver- 
sion, when I tried to send a report to the 
printer when it was off-line, the program 
dumped me into DOS with the cryptic 
message “Processing line:! write fault er- 


ror writing device PRN. Abort, Retry, Ig- 
nore?” and promptly crashed when I 
chose Retry. The Windows version resist- 
ed my attempts to crash it, and its message , 
while only slightly less cryptic, was at least 
attractively boxed with the Windows 
graphic for error messages. 

If you stick to the Windows version, 
you should find Palantir Filer an attrac- 
tive, efficient addition to your Windows li- 
brary. It handles the basic database tasks 
swiftly and painlessly, and its Windows 
environment gives it the advantages of 
multitasking and networking absent in 
many similar products. — Janet Lewis 


PC-FILE III 


PC-File III, the popular program from Jim 
Button’s ButtonWare, is a meat-and-pota- 
toes flat-file database that gets the job done 
without sophisticated side orders or an ex- 
pensive price tag. At $59.95 , PC-File III is 
a strong price performer for the inexperi- 
enced or weekend database user who 
needs a speedy database with a no-non- 
sense approach. 


PC-File Ill's tutorial is simply its slim 
manual. The program comes without a 
disk tutorial, sample database files, or 
many example scenarios, but it really 
doesn't need those aids. The manual’s 
step-by-step chapters offer adequate expla- 
nations of the functions, but you prob^ly 
won't need to spend much time on the 
manual other than for occasional refer- 
ence. After you're more familiar with the 
program, you can configure your data- 
bases individually, allowing for different 
screen colors for different files, as well as 
for different defaults. 

Installation is self-explanatory. The set- 
up program carries you through the normal 
system, configuring as well such program 
fine points as whether or not you want al- 
ways to start with the same database, if you 
want every change written to disk, and 
whether or not you want the safety of hit- 
ting FIO or Enter twice before your data is 
accepted. 

DEFINING A DATABASE During the 
start-up, if you choose a database that 
doesn’t yet exist, PC-File III automatically 
loads its PC-DEF program and brings you 
immediately to the database definition 
screen. (If you want added security, an ex- 
clamation point after the database name 
will encrypt your data from all but the de- 
fined password holder.) All you need to do 
is enter up to 42 fields of 12 characters or 
less and the field lengths from I to 65 — ex- 
cept for your last field, which you can des- 
ignate as a Super field. This Super field, 
used only with 20 or fewer fields, is space 
for comments, notes, or any other lengthy 
text. You can also designate Numeric Data 
fields or fields with automatically generat- 
ed input such as dates, times, and address- 
es. 

You choose desired functions from the 
PC-File III master menu by entering pre- 
designated three-letter abbreviations or ap- 
propriate function key commands. Re- 
cords are added one by one, each 
displayed separately. You can then modi- 
fy, delete, display one record or browse 
tiuough all, and find records through wild- 
card, scanning, and “sounds like” (soun- 
dex) searches. 

Most operation modules are simple and 
self-explanatory, with plenty of prompts. 
The more complex reporting function. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
294 



There^ nothing 
standard aboui 
this coiporate 
standkd. 


The standard is MultiMate Advantage" 

The word processing software pro^am 
found on the “approved” list of most major 
companies. 

Corporate standard aside, MultiMate 
Advantage also lives up to people standards. 

Because it lets you customize to fit your 
needs. 

Fbr example, with the new columnar 
feature, creating up to eight columns on the 
screen Ls no longer wishM thinking. 

Neither is printing those columns on a 
single page. In fact, MultiMate Advantage 
supports over 350 dififerent printers. 

It also supports a new 40,000-word 
thesaurus. As well as a 110,000-word 
dictionary (complete with medical and legal 
jargon), which you can easily customize to 
include your own frequently used words. 

And if you still need more reasons why 
this corporate standard isn’t standard, look 
no further than MultiMate Advantage’s 
keyboard. It’s been specially design^ just 
for word processing. 

Fbr the name of your nearest authorized 


Ashton-Tkte dealer, call (800) 437-4329, 
Extension 234. And get your hands 
on MultiMate Advantage. 

It’s the first word processing program 
good enough to live up to everyone’s 
standards. 


MciItilMIafte 

Advantage 

T!« Ptofesswnal Wxd Processor 

wirii the power of MuhiMate 13 Series arid tnuch more. 


ASHTON Tate A 


Rt'quiros IBM'PC or lOO'bcomiratible.TVademarks/owner: MultiMate/Multimale Inlemalional, an Ashton-Thlc company; 
Ashion Thtc/Ashlon Thte: IBM/ International Business Machines Corp. © 1986 A.shton Tkte. All rights reserved. 

CIRCLE 210 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


however, leads you through a lengthy and 
cumbersome process of creating report 
formats, field selection, record criteria se- 
lection, and other general preparation. PC- 
File III will send your report to your dis- 
play or printer, as well as write to your 
disk. Snapshot images can be sent to disk 
or printer, which speeds up the mailing la- 
bel process considerably. These images 
are actually predefined command strings. 

Through the master menu, you can also 
request sorting (including roman numerals 
for outline processing), binary searches, 
global updates and deletes, smart key cre- 
ations (defining open Alt-key combina- 
tions), and edit masks for controlling field- 
name input. 

INTERNATIONAL APPEAL Button- 
Ware’s inexpensive and speedy database 
has long been a popular favorite. It’s even 
been translated into over 13 languages, in- 
cluding Arabic and Icelandic. PC-File 
Ill’s approach, however, is a two-edged 
sword, sacrificing flexibility for ease of 
use and speed. Nevertheless, in its fourth 
version, PC-File III is a strong candidate 
in the basic flat-file category. 

— Christina Dyar 


PEACHTEXT5000 


PeachTexi 5000's List Manager is a sim- 
ple-to-use but fairly flexible program for 
working with single files. List Manager’s 
extensive use of fill-in screens to assist in 
determining exactly what is needed to get 
the job done is a significant benefit. 

PeachTexi 5000 is an integrated pack- 
age that also includes the PeachTexi Word 
Processor, Random House Electronic 
Thesaurus. Spelling Proofreader, and 
PeachCalc Elecironic Spreadsheet. While 
its List Manager component is primarily 
intended for maintaining address files to 
work with PeachTexi word processing 
form letters, the program has facilities for 
general data management as well. 

PeachText's List Manager allows only 
a limited number of records, a maximum 
of 14, but many users may find that num- 
ber ample for address files or list docu- 
ments to work with form letters. 

THREE INDEXES All fields with List 
Manager are alphanumeric text fields, 
without the fancy range-testing and vari- 
ous field types of some other programs. 


You can, however, set assumed or default 
field entries quite easily; this feature is 
very helpful when you must enter the same 
data over and over again. The ability to de- 
clare three indexes per file, which are con- 
stantly updated with new entries, and the 
ease of combining even dissimilar files 
lend a lot of flexibility to the program. 

You cannot sort PeachText’s List Man- 
ager files except during the reporting pro- 
cess. For most users of this scale product, 
sorting is not at all necessary, especially 
with the ability to declare three concurrent 
indexes. When you do sort during the re- 
porting process, you can sort on up to three 
levels, yielding, for example, mailing la- 
bels in order by state, ZIP code within 
state, and last name within ZIP code. As 
with riKist List Manager functions, you 
specify sort fields for a report by using a 
fill-in screen — a very clear way of working 
with what could otherwise be difficult con- 
cepts and commands. 

PeachText's List Manager is especially 
good at creating label printing formats, 
and it comes with ready-to-use or custom- 
ized formats for mailing labels and contin- 
uous form index cards. 

FIVE DISKS TO LOAD PeachText 
5000 comes on eight disks, counting the 
two upgrade disks called The Toolkit. 
While List Manager itself only requires 
121K bytes of disk space, hard disk users 
must load five disks’ worth of program as 
well as parts of the other disks for the pro- 
gram to be installed correctly. The only 
drawback in installing the program I could 
find was that information for installing 
dual floppy drive systems is in the front of 
the manual and hard drive instructions are 
in an appendix. Otherwise the installation 
process is very clear and even gives you re- 
assuring on-screen messages if all went 
well — a nice touch. 

PeachText comes with a reference 
guide and a lesson-plan hitorial manual. I 
found both volumes very helpful and their 
indexes accurate. 

List Manager by itself may not be a ter- 
rifically strong database management pro- 
gram, but it is not intended to be. The pro- 
gram does what it is supposed to do: it 
works well with simple files and offers a 
sound list or file management facility to 
users who have a primary need PeachText 


F A c r 


L H 


PC-Fife///, Version 4.0 
ButtonWare Inc. 

P.O. Box 5786; Bellevue. WA 98006; (800) J*BUTrON; (206) 454-0479 
List Price: $59.95 Requires: 128K RAM. onedisk drive, DOS 2. Oor later. 
In Short: A speedy, inexpensive, no-frills database system that sacrifices flexi- 
bility for ease of use. Helpful features include soundex searches, binary search- 
es. and “super” fields 
for lengthy text entry . 

Not copy protected . 



From PC-Filc Ill’s 
master menu you can 
select functions by 
typing a three- 
character command 
or pressing the 
corresponding 
function key. 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
296 


■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


FACT F I 1. F 


PeachT ext 5000, Vcrsion2.11 
Peachtree Software Inc. 

4355 International Blvd.; Norcross. GA 30093; (8(X)) 247-3224; 

(800) 554-8900 

I^ist Price: $295 Requires: 128K RAM. one disk drive. DOS I.Oorlater 
In Short: The List Manager part of the integrated package PeachTextSOOO is a 
flexible and easy-to-use 
file manager works well 
with simple files. Not 
copy protected. 


LIST OiVi:: 
♦♦ Cortine F;:« 


PeachText SOOO'jL/j/ 
Marnier makes 
combining files fairly 
easy. Once the files to 
be combined have 
been identified, you fill 
in a correspondence 
screen, which 
indicates the 
relationship between 
fields in the two files. 


Flit C:SAfflIl 

, ,l*e(T , . , 

I riM 

i ::ty 
pjiont 

* I'taltr ftii'etr 

Lirt :rde: 

? 5t«ls 
! -PKiai rrr. 


F;;t CiEXAWUl 
',’.r 


^ 

: - It'cir 
: * 

Is • >*t:ssr5 


:'r S.'. «4 iLtrfi 
.'ir.v.is ;'K "i, if T/rffi 


5000’s other functions. The program’s 
ease of use and integrated combination of 
features have made me a loyal fan. 

— Bruce Brown 


PERSONAL DECISION 
SERIES— DATA 
EDITION 


The IBM Personal Decision Series— Data 
Edition, a full-bodied flat-Tile database, 
lays the foundation for the other members 
in IBM’s Personal Decision Series (PDS) 
family. As a standalone package, PDS 
Data is a competent and able database with 
some timesaving features. 

One feature that won’t save you any 
time, though, is the program’s bulky 600- 
page manual. Encased in an 1 1 - by 8-inch 
binder, the manual is sure to stick out on 
your bookshelf, although the binder lies 
flat when open so you don’t have to cope 
with flying pages. Despite the concise 
glossary, bullet-listed recaps of proce- 
dures, bullet-listed reminders, and a 208- 
page tutorial, I found the documentation 
confusing and awkward. I kept flipping 


■ To save keystrokes in 
PDS Data, you select 
menu choices, functions, 
and files by rotating your 
choices for a task with the 
F9orF10key. 


back and forth between the glossary, the 
tutorial section, and the “Using” section. 
The on-screen tutorial presents a good 
overview of the program if you just want to 
get up and going. Unfortunately, to make 
the best use of PDS Data, you’ll have to 
spend hours reading and rereading the 
manual. 

Program installation is straightforward 
but lengthy. It took me 10 minutes, which 
seemed like forever. First you install the 
three program floppy disks and then three 
more product-enhancement update flop- 


pies (four if you’re updating communica- 
tions, too). The Install and Update Replace 
programs prompt you along the way while 
you play the disk-shuffle game. 

MENUDRIVEN Afler/>D5Dnra is Anal- 
ly installed and you’ve read IBM’s version 
of IVar and Peace, the clean and easy 
menu-driven program is a refreshing 
change. PDS Data opens to the Files 
menu, which offers choices such as DeAne 
File; DeAne Sort; DeAne Additional In- 
dex, which lets you build up to six addi- 
tional deAnitions if you want more than 
one way to access your records; Enter 
Data; (^ry File, which selects records 
with If-And-Or logic, displays or prints re- 
cords, totals values, and performs calcula- 
tions on two numeric values; and Copy 
File for cloning, reformatting, and con- 
verting Ales from BASIC, TEXT, or DIF 
Ales to indexed and direct Ales. From a 
window on each module’s opening screen, 
you can switch among the Files Menu, Ap- 
plications Menu (for creating procedures). 
Communications Menu, and Utilities 
Menu (for maintaining libraries). 

Function key commands appropriate to 
the menu you’re in are also displayed. For 
example, in the deAne Aelds screen, com- 
mands include help, insert Aeld, erase 
field, print definition, return, and cancel. 
To save keystrokes, you select menu 
choices, functions, and data filenames by 
rotating your choices for a particular task 
with the F9 or the FIO key. 

To help you enter data more efficiently, 
PDS Data lets you specify entry codes to 
determine what you see and use. You can 
also set up data verification codes and 
masks. 

TIME SAVERS The Applications mod- 
ule includes two helpful features, create/ 
run procedures and a run program. If you 
have a series of tasks you perform repeat- 
edly, you can link a group of PDS Data 
tasks to cany out the job. Creating and mn- 
ning a procedure stores sequences and 
saves options such as record and field se- 
lection. With the procedure feature, for in- 
stance, you could define, sort, and print an 
expense Ale. If you want to enter some in- 
formation manually or check something 
during the tun, you can do so by entering a 
“substitute code” when you define the 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
297 



■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 



procedure. At the time you run the proce- 
dure, you can enter the desired information 
at the Enter Substitute screen. If not, PDS 
Data will stop for you to enter the correct 
variable. 

The run program feature lets you access 
Report +, another member of the PDS 
family that gives PDS Data relational ca- 
pabilities, or temporarily leave the PDS 
environment to run a BASIC program, 
DOS .COM or .EXE program, or a .BAT 
file. 

IBM Personal Decision Series— Data 
Edition is a solid base for the PDS family 
of software. Alone, the program functions 
as a well-rounded but unexciting flat-file 
database. — Christina Dyar 


Q& A 

Q & A, Version 1.1, is the Thoroughly 
Modem Millie of the database set. Al- 
though still a relative newcomer on the 
scene, Q &A presents a polished, easy-to- 
use data management environment aug- 
mented by a pioneering use of artificial in- 
telligence. If you’re unimpressed by the 


trendy dazzle conferred by the presence of 
AI, you’ll be pleased to know the program 
stands on its own quite nicely without it. 

Q & A includes a file manager, report 
manager, and a word processor — all work- 
alikes to their counterparts in the 
PFS./IBM Assistant Series. As with the 
programs in the PFS: series, the most 
striking thing about Q <£ A is the ease with 
which it works. I read a paragraph or two 
in the clearly written manual, quickly de- 
fined a data file, and — no muss, no fuss — 
imported a comma-delimited ASCII file; I 
was ready to go to work. 

The program has special support for 
importing ASCII, DIF, PFS.File a^ I-2-S 
files, but export is limited to DIF or ASCII 
files. If you intend to use this program in 
an environment dominated by users of 
some other database, at least they won’t be 
able to quarrel with its accessibility. 

Data entry The process of file defi- 
nition tells a lot of the 0 <S A story. Most 
data management programs fall into one of 
two categories: either you define the fields 
and the program generates a default data 
entry screen, or you must define fields as 
well as design a default data entry screen. 


Q & A compresses that process (read: 
makes easier) so that as you design a de- 
fault data entry screen, it does a lot of the 
work of defining the associated fields. 

Rather than some rudimentary, special- 
purpose editor to design data entry 
screens, you have the service of Q dc A’s 
capable word processor, including a line- 
drawing command useful for boxing in 
sections of the screen. Field lengths are de- 
termined by the amount of empty space on 
the data entry screen to the right of the field 
name. Although you can use a terminator 
character to explicitly limit field length to a 
smaller space, when 1 did so it had no ef- 
fect on the file-storage requirements. So 
why bother? 

Q&A fields can occupy up to an entire 
21 -line screen, and any record can have a 
maximum of 10 screens (within that limit, 
any number of fields is permissible). And 
with the ability to perform substring 
searches on the contents of such fields, 
Q&A doesn’t ignore all that data. Say that 
you use a field to keep notes about your 
telephone conversations with customers. 
When your company announces a promo- 
tion on a product, you might use this fea- 
ture to locate prospects by searching for 
any mention of it in past conversations. 

DATA MANAGEMENT Specifying a 
search for information inaQ&A database 
takes the familiar fill-in-the-form ap- 
proach. You’ll need to master some sym- 
bolic syntax to define relationships such as 
greater than or less than, but ample help 
screens are only a keystroke away. While 
you can use calculations as input to re- 
cords, lookup access is limited to a special- 
purpose table you construct for that use 
only (the program cannot reference a data 
file through a table lookup). 

Consistent with its emphasis on ease of 
use, Q&A offers a colloquial approach to 
indexing in the way of a menu choice 
called Speed Up Searches. Multilevel sorts 
are available in combinations of ascending 
or descending order, but sorting operates 
only on the output of a query, not the data 
file itself Consider the chief limitation of 
that design: although you are paying for a 
sort in delay time, you forfeit your invest- 
ment as soon as you terminate the current 
inquiry (there’s one for the wish list). 

As easy to use as Q <£ A’s methods of 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
298 




Even the best of personal computers 
can have a bad day. Blackouts happen. 
Usually at the worst possible time. 

But power interruptions don’t need to 
be business interruptions. And lost power 
shouldn’t result in lost data. Not with the 
POWERMAKER' Micro UPS from Topaz. 

Designed specifically for hard disc and 
critical-use business systems, Powermaker 
Micro UPS ensures a continuous supply 
of smooth sine wave power even during 


a total blackout. 

And there’s more. Powermaker Micro 
UPS also removes spikes and other 
error-producing transients from incoming 
power, protecting your PC’s sensitive 
circuitry. 

So, if your PC needs a little help once 
in a while, give it Powermaker Micro UPS 
protection. For nothing down. Call us 
today at (619) 279-0831, or contact your 
local Square D distributor. 


TORAZ 


CIRCLE 366 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


F A C T 


Q&A, Version 1.1 
Syinaniec 

10201 Torre Avc: Cupertino. CA 95014; (408) 253-9600 
list Price: S299 Requires: 5 1 2K RAM. two disk drives, DOS 2.0or later. 
In .Short: This capable database management tool excels in ease of use and 
ea.se of learning. In addition to a Hie manager, a report manager, and a word 
processor, it includes the 
naiural-languagc-based 
Intelligent Assistant. Not 
copy protected. 


Q& A' s natural 
lanfiuti^e interface, 
the Intelligent 
Assistant, interprets 
Enfilish-like 
in.structions ami 
conveys them to 
Q& A s Jile or report 
manager for 





manipulating data Tiles are, Symantec lift- 
ed ease of use to new heights by including 
a natural-language-based assistant facility. 
Out of the box, the Intelligent Assistant 
can interpret an extremely limited set of 
English-like insmictions and convey them 
to Q <S A’s file or report manager for exe- 
cution. The hidden strength of this facility 
is its ability to associate a much larger 
number of terms with the few primitives it 
already recognizes. While the Intelligent 
Assistant cannot expand what Q&A's file 
manager can do. it can significantly lower 
the level of exactitude required from a 
user. 

The price for such convenience is not 
entirely paid when you hand over a piece 
of your paycheck (or Q & A. The Intelli- 
gent Assistant needs to be "taught" about 
each data file you create, and there are 
some delays, both in data entry and when 
querying through the Assistant, that you 
won’t experience using the file manager 
directly. Q&A does a great job of inform- 
ing you when it will require some extra 
time, and about how long a delay to ex- 
pect. Somehow, I don't mind waiting so 
much when I'm treated with such consid- 
eration. 

Nonetheless, the time needed to com- 
plete the one-time-only “instruction” for 
each data file can be about 20 minutes, and 
the process can require as much or more 
skill than performing queries without the 
Assistant's help. So for an inexperienced 
user, the Assistant may be most effective 
when an experienced person handles the 
configuration work. Even after you teach 
it, the Assistant is a bit slow to use; it must 
ask you repeatedly to make certain 
choices, and misinterpretation is at risk. 
For example. I asked Q&Alo show me all 
the people living in California. Although I 
intended "all” to mean “every record 
where STATE equals CA,” Q&A inter- 
preted it to mean “show all fields.” When 
I removed the word all from the query 
(“show me the people living in CA”), the 
result was a list consisting only of the 
STATE field. 

TRADE-OFF The experienced person 
has a trade-off to consider; spend the time 
teaching the Intelligent Assistant and put 
up with some reduction in query response 
time to take advantage of its alluring En- 


■ Consistent with its 
emphasis on ease of use, 
Q&A offers a colloquial 
approach to indexing 
via a menu choice called 
Speed Up Searches. 


glish-like query syntax, or work directly 
with the file manager. The bottom line on 
the subject is this: you may not always 
want it. but the Intelligent Assistant is nice 
to have around when you do. 

The word processing module means 
that mail-merge is a menu-driven option in 
Q&A. While it efeserves credit for auto- 
matically suppressing print lines contain- 
ing blank fields, the program cannot rejus- 
tify lines of text when the length of a field 
causes the text to exceed the current mar- 
gin. Q&A offers a built-in macro proces- 


sor that features keystroke recording and 
playback, but it would be more useful if it 
gave you a menu of available macros from 
which to choose. You can edit macro files 
with Q&A's word processor, but the mac- 
ro processor lacks commands with which 
to pause for user input or perform simple 
loops. The sole place in which some logi- 
cal control can be exercised is during data 
entry. A simple set of programming state- 
ments limited to this context can condi- 
tionally calculate entries or move the cur- 
sor to a different field in the record. 

Q&AtkA only excels in ease of use, it 
has a superb manual, an on-disk tutorial, 
and sample data files to move you through 
the learning curve smoothly. Keep in mind 
that the program has a large appetite for 
RAM (512K bytes). On a floppy system, 
frequent disk accesses and some disk 
swapping will slow you down. Q&A's In- 
telligent Assistant is a fascinating techno- 
logical achievement, but it seems most ap- 
propriate for inexperienced users, who 
may need some coaching to configure it 
correctly. Nevertheless, even if you never 
use the Intelligent Assistant, Q <£ A is a ca- 
pable, comfortable data management 
tool . — Dick Ridington 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
300 







TEST OF STRENGTH: 



linfrai”® 


eadsheet 


Spri 

I^odetii^ 

^^Itatfctlcal 

Analysis 


n-Procedural 

Language 


Applications 

Generator 


AppH^tions 

Generator 


CIRCLE 208 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


Screen Painter 


Programing 


TableTalk 


The Aksistant 


LAN Support 


ipport 


d8ne in IS > tridemaiii of Ashton Tale 

AT&T UNIX IS i liademarh of AT&T Corp 

WANG/VS IS a iraOemark ol Wang Labomenet Inc 

VAX/VMS IS a lr»Oeinark ol Digital Eguipmenl Corp 

IBM IS a traoemarii ol iniernalional Business Machines Corp 


PC/FOCUS gives 
Micro Managers the 
muscle for future growth 
and expansion. 

Frankly, there are many capable DBMS’s available in 
today’s PC marketplace. 

But only PC/FOCUS has the extra capabilities you 
need to support your growth and expansion. Decision 
support capabilities like business graphics, statistical 
analysis and spreadsheet. Application portability to 
VAXA/MS. WANGA/S, AT&T UNIX and IBM mainframe 
environments. Even built-in micro-to-mainframe links for 
data transfer! 

So when you select your PC DBMS, make sure it’s 
the one that “rings the belC PC/FOCUS. 

For details, call the IBI office nearest you or write to 
Donald Wszolek, Dept. 103, Information Builders, Inc., 
1250 Broadway, New York NY 10001. 


Business Graphics 


Im PC/FOCUS 


Report Writer 


Information Builders, Inc. 

World Headquarters: New York City U.S.A., (212) 736-4433 
Toronto. Canada: (416) 364-2760 • London, England: 903-6111 

One language. One solution. 


Screen Painter 
Dialogue Manager 




■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 




H A C' I 


I 1. H 


Query III, Version 3 
Hoyle and Hoyle Software Inc. 

7I6S. Elam Ave.: Greensboit). N.C. 27403; (919) 378-1050 
List Price: $99.95 Requires: I28K RAM. one disk drive. DOS 1 . 1 or later. 
In Short: This simple flat filer needs a morc-friendly command structure both 
to complement its easy-to-use menu fonmit and helpful user manual and to 
compete in today’s data- Mmumm 



base market. Not copy 
pn)tectcd. 

ciwITsSoN 

RCAOefiSERVlCeCARO 


Query Iir.s help 
screen lists the sinffle- 
letter cotnmunJs you 
use to invoke most of 
the program's 
functions. 


iliri 

HELP 


,'fio . 
(No.) 
CP) 
CfIC.) 


comwtvS 

Iflete Current Pecori 
ktivate Current Pecord 
Load Pecord fMier ■ 

Increase Currefit Pecord ftunber by 'lo • 

Increase Current Pecord tiumber by 1 
Decrease Current Pecord Nuiber by ^No.) 

Perl ace Current Pecord 

Chan^ Field Inforetation 

Print Current Pecord to Screen 

List Current Pecord to Printer vitb Field Labels 

List Current Pecord to Printer Mithout Field Labels 

List Current Pecord to Printer in Special flaillist Foriwt 

Hold Screen Wl 

Hold Soreen OFF 

Melf 'Print this List) 

Eiit PrograR 

Ent Prolan (Ito Printer Cleanup' 


QUERY III 

Query III is a simple flat-file program that 
performs basic data-handling functions. 
The program is especially good at simple 
file applications that do not require elabo- 
rate reporting capabilities. 

Query III uses a simple-to-use menu 
format for program function choices. De- 
signing a file and entering data are both 
very straightforward. 

Gentle tutorial The user manual 
is one of the nicest features of the program. 
The manual is unassuming and leads the 
user clearly through copying the distribu- 
tion disk, which is not copy protected. 
Once the program is ready to tun. the man- 
ual guides you keystroke for keystroke 
through the tutorial pttxiess of setting up a 
phone list file. 

The manual uses a double-level ap- 
proach to explaining the program. The first 
is the keystroke tutorial in which most of 
the program’s basic functions are experi- 
ence. The second level is a more com- 
plete explanation of each of the major pro- 
gram parts. The tone throughout is gentle 
and reassuring. That reassurance is needed 
later on. 

ARCHAIC USER INTERFACE Once 
you’ve built a file and entered data, the 
program’s View function lets you look at, 
edit, and mark records in the file for dele- 
tion. At this point the program begins to 
get more difficult to use because the com- 
mands to direct the viewing are single let- 
ters. Typing H when prompted for a com- 
mand will display the list of appropriate 
commands, but this archaic user interface 
is not at all friendly and certainly is not 
competitive with other database programs 
on the market. 

Query Ill's search function allows up to 
40 criteria for searching for a given item, 
but again one-letter codes are used for se- 
lecting search conditions and conjunc- 
tions. The program provides a lot of func- 
tionality in searching but demands work to 
make it happen. 

Query III lacks a report writer and re- 
quires an external text editor to write in- 
structions for formatting a report. The 
manual suggests that you make the pro- 


gram do your bidding by using “your fa- 
vorite editor or word processor” to write 
an appropriate command file that can be 
acce.ssed by Query III. 1 exited Query III 
and created an ASCII text file as directed. 
The program works just as described in the 
manual, but the effort of programming 
with single-letter commands doesn’t seem 
worth it to me. 

Query III does include a preformatted 
mailing-label report format that can be 
used immediately if you use the prescribed 
field names and sizes. 

While Query’ III has a rudimentary pro- 
gramming language called Autopro, 
which can control the program to perform 
certain repetitive functions, the Autopro 
program file must also be written outside 
Query III. 

An optional program called Query III 
Calc includes a calculator and report gen- 
erator. Query III Calc, which costs an ad- 
ditional $49.95, offers the editing capabili- 
ties necessary for the report writing and 
program files as well as for adding arith- 
metic functions tor Query III data fields. 

In sum. Query III has a nice tone and a 
few interesting features, but its command 
structure mu,st be made more friendly if the 


program is to meet the needs of many be- 
ginning users. The inclusion of a text edi- 
tor as a standard item would also be a great 
improvement. — Bruce Brown 


REFLEX, 

THE ANALYST 


If you’d like to get statistical information 
or do financial analysis from your database 
without transferring the data to your 
spreadsheet, you’ll like Reflex, The Arm- 
lysl from Borland international. Reflex of- 
fers functions galore; 4 for financial fore- 
casting, 13 for mathematical formulas, 16 
for data manipulation, 3 for logical pro- 
gramming. and 13 for special purposes 
such as setting flags and calculating data 
from different records. It also has the 
speed to get you most results by the time 
you can say 1 ... 2 ... 3. 

If you’re thinking of spending a lot of 
money on a business graphics package that 
will have trouble importing your data, 
think about Reflex instead. With Reflex 
you can plot any of five chart types — scat- 
ter, line, bar, stacked bar, and pie — using 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1985 
302 



AST^ EGA Sokidon: 
Upgradeahili^Is 
lustAChipAwav 


Introducing AST-3G Plus 


A lot of EGA boards bundle together IBM’ EGA, 
MDA, CGA and Hercules' modes, whether you 
need them or not. And like it or not, you pay for 
them. AST-3G offers something a little different- 
customer's choice. 

Optional CGA, Hercules, MOA Modes. Buy 

AST-3G's super EGA graphics solution today, and if 
you don't need compatibility with Hercules, CGA 
and MDA, you don't have to buy it. If you change 
your mind later that's okay too. Upgradeability is 
just a chip away using the A^ Plus Enhancement Kit. 

Easy Upgradeability. The Plus Enhancement 
Kit makes the upgrade to CGA, Hercules and MDA 
modes a simple matter of just snapping a chip into 
the AST-3G board. And for you corporate buyers, 
here's your chance to mix and match several boards 
according to your needs. 

ACT*3G Is Feature Perfect With or without the 
Plus Option, AST-3G offers high-resolution 640 x 350 
graphics, full-spectrum color capabilities, high- 
quality text and across-the-board compatibility with 
all your applications, including business/presenta- 
tion graphics, CAD/CAM, graphic arts and desktop 
publishing. A^-3G virtually transforms your PC 
into a presentation medium to create, preview and 
present clear, clean, crisp text and sizzling graphics, 
i ^ Graph*ln-'rhe-Box~ Software 

Included. You can produce a variety of 
jKjgS sharp, colorful charts from spread- 
sheets, word processing, database 
programs and more using this revo- 
lutionary RAM-resident software 
we've included. Graph-In-The-Box 
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■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


fields from individual records or summar- 
ies of fields from a number of records. You 
can then dump the chart to a dot matrix 
printer or plot it with scales, titles, and 
grids on an HP or Sixshooter plotter in glo- 
rious color. 

GROUNDBREAKINC While its com- 
petitors imitate either PFS: File or dBASE 
III, Reflex is paving new ground. Virtually 
everything about it is unique for a database 
program: its interface, its views, and its 
implementation. As a result, working with 
R^ex evokes a blend of reactions. Occa- 
sionally. you think of the Apple Macintosh 
and Microsoft Windows. At other times, 
you can almost believe you’re zipping 
through a very well-implemented integrat- 
ed package. Other times, you’ll swear 
you’re working with a relational database 
management system. One thing is sure, if 
you start using Reflex, it will change the 
way you visualize and manipulate data. 

Reflex’s interface includes a menu bar. 
pull-down and pop-up windows, a 1-2-3- 
like command structure, mouse support, 
and high-resolution graphics in black and 
white. You access menu features by hitting 
the Slash key and either pointing to the fea- 


■ By VARYinga^^yZ^Jc 
record enough times, you 
create a dummy database 
that you can then use for 
simulations, what-if 
analysis, and forecasting. 


lure or entering its first letter. If a feature is 
unavailable, it is illegible. If you are a 
command-line fanatic, the interface may 
grate on you in the beginning. Persevere; it 
will grow on you after awhile. 

You create a database simply by de- 
signing a form and entering data. Reflex 
automatically assigns a field type based on 
the first character entered into the field and 
predefines the field’s length. You create 
calculated fields by entering formulas or 
functions into the appropriate fields. A for- 
mula is signaled by entering an equal sign 


as the first character in the field. From that 
point on. you can search, sort, and other- 
wise manipulate your data. 

While most of R^ex's commands are 
standard features in database programs. 
VARY is in a class by itself. By VARYing 
a record enough times, you create a dum- 
my database. You can then use VARYed 
database for simulations, what-if analysis, 
and forecasting. 

ANOTHER DIMENSION No matter 
how you manipulate data, though, you 
will have to view it. and viewing data is 
where Reflex really sparkles. R^ex does 
to databases what film does to storytell- 
ing — it adds another dimension. It may be 
a flat-file manager, but it allows you to 
view that one flat file from more perspec- 
tives than some relational databases allow 
open files. 

Most database programs limit the way 
you can view the data. You either see the 
record in isolation with a predefined form i 
la PFS:File. or you browse through a list- 
ing of all the records ^ la dBASE III. The 
only other alternative you have is to create 
a report with breakpoints and calculated 
fields. In addition to these standard views, 
Reflex offers Graph and Crosstab views. 
The former allows you to compare fields 
as a graphic representation, and the latter 
lets you see trends as a result of calcula- 
tions on fields. Best of all, you can have 
more than one view on-screen at a time by 
splitting the sereen into windows. 

The most unique view is Crosstab. Part 
spreadsheet and part report generator, it 
enables you to cross tabulate on numeric 
fields, fire view categorizes the data and 
then summarizes the information in a tabu- 
lar format. With it you can calculate stuns, 
averages, counts, maxs and mins, standard 
deviation, and variance. You define the 
categories by which it breaks down the 
data. You can specify, for example, a par- 
ticular value, a numeric range, or a set of 
conditions. The view displays the summa- 
ry function, the fields being operated on, 
their values, and the numeric results. 

MINOR DRAWBACKS Reflex's draw- 
backs are trivial when compared with the 
product’s value, but they need to be point- 
ed out. The most obvious is the lack of col- 
or support. Another is the lack of a trans- 


F A C T I- I L 1-; 


Reflex, The Analyst, Version 1.1 
I Borland Intenuilional Inc. 

i 4585 Seems Valley Dr.: Seims Valley, CA 95066; (408) 438-8400 
LLsI Price: $149.95 Requires: 384K RA.Vl. onedisk drive. DOS 2. Oor laier. 
In Short: Borland’s /?e/7e.v ofTcrs flexibiliiy, power, and ease of use a( a ridicu- 
lously low price. If you don’t have the program, you’ll want to gel it — you can’t 
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PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
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■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


parent bridge between the two modules. 
You should not have to exit into DOS to 
access a utility, especially a report utility. 
Reflex lacks the color and the bridge be- 
cause it was written to take advantage of 
high-resolution graphics; so RGB moni- 
tors need to sit idle. Once we all have fully 
populated EGA boards, Borland should 
add color. And because the Iv/o Reflex files 
are both over 250K bytes, they cannot fit 
on a single floppy disk. Borland could, 
however, implement an install process that 
would merge the two or supply a batch file 
that makes them seem as though they were 
merged. 

By far, though. Reflex'^ weakest area is 
the size and the organization of its tutorial 
and two reference sections. Between the 
sheer bulk and the chapter-page pagination 
scheme, finding anything is virtually im- 
possible without the use of a Huffman al- 
gorithm. Even if the documentation is 
pared down, it will still need a rewrite. 
There is too much nonstandard language. 
For example, importing a file is found un- 
der translating, and copy is copy in the Re- 
port view but ditto in the Crosstab view. 
Even Crosstab sounds more like a new 
Coca-Cola product than a window for tab- 
ulating data. If Borland doesn't redo this 
manual, someone else will make a mint 
writing a concise, easily understood man- 
ual for Reflex. 

Despite the lack of color, the need to 
exit into DOS, and the horrendous man- 
ual, Reflex. The Analyst is going to be- 
come a standard for two reasons: Borland 
is selling it cheaply enough, and it's more 
than good enough to be the new standard in 
its class. Reflex will eventually change the 
market, and for the better. Even if you go 
on to another database package — and you 
will if your needs grow — you will want 
many of Reflex’s features. 

— Vincent Puglia 


UNI-FILE 


When users of Univair Systems’ vertical- 
market packages for the health care, insur- 
ance, and legal profe.ssions want to cus- 
tomize their systems, they buy UNI-FILE, 
Version 5.23. Even if your business 
doesn’t mn on one of Univair Systems’ 


■ UNI-FILE is worth a 
look if you need a simple 
list manager that non- 
technical users can adapt 
to easily. It will prompt 
you through each step. 


vertical packages, UNI-FILE is worth a 
look if you need a simple list manager that 
nontechnical users can adapt to easily. In 
any case, keep an eye on this program — 
better things are in the offing. 

Setting up a data file is a straightfor- 
ward, menu-driven operation. UNI-FILE 
supports date, numeric, and string data 
types. The program will prompt you 
through each step, including asking 
whether a field is to be input from the key- 
board, calculated based on an existing 
field, or looked up in another file. 


VniTUAL FIELDS UNI-FILE can also 
retrieve data from other files for display 
only: these virtual fields display on the 
screen like a normal table lookup field, but 
they are not stored with the record. Al- 
though such fields are designed to support 
data entry, there’s no reason you couldn’t 
use this feature to develop a multifile data- 
base inquiry application. You could create 
a file structured to have a single stored 
field: eustomer number. Virtual fields 
would include Last Order, Credit Limit, 
and Open Balance. When you retrieved a 
customer’s record, UNI-FILE would look 
up that customer’s last order from an open 
orders file, credit limit from a credit file, 
and open balance from a receivables file. 
Since the program would look up these 
fields each time you retrieved a customer’s 
record, this sort of inquiry would always 
give you up-to-date information. 

But there are a few catches to this excit- 
ing possibility. If you organize your files to 
support multifile inquiries, you may be 
fiustrated when you want a report. Since 
UNI-FILE's report writer is limited to a 
single file, you won’t be able to duplicate 
on paper what you can see on the screen. 

Now that I’ve thrown water on the fire. 




A C T I- I 1. (•; 


UNI-FILE, Version S.23 

Univair Systems Inc. 

y()24St. Charles Rtvk Rd,;St. Louis. MO 6.^1 14:(3I4)426-I()W 
List Price: $19.S Requires: 128KRAM,lwodiskdrives.IX)S2,0orlaier. 
In Short: A simple, straightforward list manager that nontechnical users can 
leant to use easily; the upcoming Version 5.24 offers to catapult the program 
outof PC Magazine Labs 
Category I and on to 
more advanced databa.se 
management. Nt>t copy 
protected. 

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Unixwr Systems' 
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orientation gives 
UNI-FILE «/nv 
extras, such as the 
Typewriter motle 
utility that expedites 
label printing. 




PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
306 





■ FLAT-FILE DATABASES 


UU E D I T O R ' S 
An C H O I C E 


NewcomerQ&A, Version 1. 1, 
uses state-cf-the art artificial intelli- 
gence and superb overall design to 
supply the missing link between ease 
of use and power in fiat-file data- 
base management systems. It is the 
clear product (^choice in its class. 
C.I.P. (The Concentric Information 
Processor) is not the most powerful 
product in this field, but its ‘ ‘visu- 
aV ’ user imerface and report gener- 
ator make it the only database prod- 
uct around that's so much fun to 
learn and use that you won’t want to 
leave your desk at the end of the day . 
AlphaJthree. Version 1.0, proves 
that database power ctnd menu-driv- 
en flat-file systems can live together 
quite nicely and with dBASE III 
compatibility to boot. 


keep this in mind: some relational func- 
tions are still better than none. Version 
5.24 of the program promises to catapult 
UNI-FILE into PC Magazine Labs Cate- 
gory 2 when it removes this limit by allow- 
ing a report to include looked-up fields. 

Calculated fields are less useful. Al- 
though you can calculate field values using 
references to other fields, the referent 
fields must be numeric, and neither calcu- 
lated nor looked-up fields qualify. So, al- 
though you can look up the amount of a 
sale in another file, you cannot use the re- 
sulting value to calculate the amount of the 
salesperson's commission. Nor could you 
add a calculated commission to a base sala- 
ry to get a net salary. Univair Systems 
promises to fix this limitation also in Ver- 
sion 5.24. 

You must specify a key as part of the 
file definition process, and that key is not 
only the basis for indexed inquiries into the 
file fiom you but also from any lookups 
originating in other files. A key isn't limit- 
ed to a single field, however; it can be just 
the first few characters of a field and in- 
clude part of as many fields as you’d like, 
provided that the entire key does not ex- 
ceed 30 characters. You cannot maintain 
multiple keys and switch among them to 


suit your needs, but you can easily change 
keys, and nonindexed sequential searches 
are available to handle the inevitable ex- 
ceptions. 

No WILDCARD The only element lack- 
ing is a wildcard. A search for “Ham” will 
find "Hamburg” and "Hamelin,” but 
there’s no way to use the substring “ham” 
to find “Southampton” and “Northamp- 
ton.” If you only want to find “Ham,” the 
program will also locate records contain- 
ing “Hampstead” and “Hampshire” but 
will display all matches for “Ham” before 
showing “Hampstead” and "Hamp- 
shire.” 

UNI -FILE'S manual contains no infor- 
mation on how to import files, and I got 
poor results performing the operation on 
my own. UNI-FILE stores data in a non- 
standard fixed format (each record con- 
tains a numeric flag field at offset zero and 
encloses the remainder of the record in 
quotes). I used tine XyW rite word process- 
ing program to modify the PC Labs sample 
files to that format (this type of reformat- 
ting requires an editor that can search and 
replace on carriage returns) and defined a 
file structure for each with UNI-FILE. 
While I was able to access the data files 
with UNI-FILE, the program tossed me 
out on my ear several times when I at- 
tempted to search and reindex the file. Un- 
ivair says UNI-FILE. Version 5.24, will 
be able to handle the problem, which sup- 
posedly originates from .some corruption 
to the files. 

UNI-FILE offers a powerful lookup fa- 
cility, but that power proves to be the ex- 
ception rather than the rule. (PC Magazine 
does not review unreleased versions of 
software, but it’s worth noting that Ver- 
sion 5.24, due out by the time you read 
this, promises to provide substantial im- 
provements.) If UNI-FILE can satisfy your 
functional needs for a daUibase, you will 
find the program easy enough for inexperi- 
enced persons to operate without extensive 
training. The written tutorial will likely un- 
horse its readers as it switches examples 
midstream, but, augmented with some 
coaching to explain the pivotal role of keys 
in searching and table lookups, UNI- 
FILE's clear design will pull most novices 
through the learning curve unscathed. 

— ^Dick Ridington 1114 


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PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
307 




Where's The Logical Connection”? 


No more spaghetti! 

If you're tired of the tangle, 
here's the easy way to connect 
printers, computers, modems and 
other devices together — in any 
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switch, and more! Each Logical 
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programmable ports (4 serial, 2 
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What's more, you can 'daisy-chain* 
them together to interconnect up to 
315 separate devices. And if you 
have computers in more than one 
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Share your printers. 

Now you can give every 
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every printer — even if they're 
strung out all over the building (up 
to 4,000' apart). And because The 
Logical Connection*" gives you 
instantaneous software control over 


which output goes to which input, 
you'll never have to unplug another 
cable to share your resources. 

Fully programmable. 

The Logical Connection*" 
provides automatic parallel to serial 
and serial to parallel conversion. Just 
plug in your devices and call up The 
Logical Connection's*" user-friendly 
configuration menu on your 
monitor. It will guide you step by 
step through the process of defining 
inputs and outputs, with extensive 
oi^ne help and easy to understand 
prompts. And to change 
connections 'on the fly,' you don't 
even have to re-configure — just 
precede your output with an 8- 
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you define) and The Logical 
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A big, smart buffer. 

You won't have any 
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The Logical Connection*" has a big 
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LEARNING AIDS: 

MANY PATHS 

TO PROFICIENCY 


Video and audio 
cassettes are 
among the 
newest options 
for helping 
novices master 
1-2-3 quickly. 
Instructor kits 
can turn the 
seasoned user 
into a tutor. 


Y ou tear open Release 2 of 1-2-3. 
Three books, six disks, four pam- 
phlets, and three miscellaneous in- 
serts spill out onto your already oveibur- 
dened desk. Your head takes a swan dive. 
You don’t want to settle down with a lot of 
reading material. You need to get 1-2-3 up 
and running — fast. You’ve got a problem. 

Despite 1-2-3's popularity (it’s still the 
best-selling integrated spreadsheet around, 
notwithstanding some grumbling that the 
new release Lotus Development Corp. 
staded shipping about a year ago isn’t as 
improved as it could be), learning the pro- 
gram for the first time is not a task that 
many would put at the top of their list of 
fun activities. Although the program is not 


tough to use once you’ve mastered the ba- 
sics, learning how to use it, as with any 
new software, can be a lonely, frustrating, 
time-consuming trial. 

Faced with the thought of trudging 
through the 344-page reference manual 
alone, you ask your colleagues how they 
learned 1-2-3. You find out that nine times 
out of ten someone who had been using it 
for a while taught them. But if you don't 
have a resident 1-2-3 exped on staff, don’t 
despair. Lotus has its own disk tutorial, 
and innovative vendors out there have 
seized the oppodunity as well. Instructor 
kits, videocassettes and audiocasettes, on- 
disk tutorials, and other aids ranging from 
expensive ($399 for one video course) to 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
309 


■ 1-2-3 LEARNING AIDS 


low cost ($14.95 for one keyboard tem- 
plate) are flooding the market. 

To help you make sense of all the avail- 
able products, I looked at 23 teaching aids 
in all: 1 1 on-disk tutorials (4 of them also 
include books). 5 videotape programs, 3 
teaching systems or instructor kits, I au- 
diocassette program, I desktop reference, 
and 2 keyboard templates. Here’s how 
they stack up. 

Interact on disk Tutorials on disk 

teach you the basic skill you want to mas- 
ter, and they're easy to use and fun to 
watch (most mn in color). Standard start- 
up procedure is to read the installation in- 
structions, load the disk or disks, and pre.ss 
Enter. Then you're off. Just follow the in- 
structions on your screen. 

All the disk tutorials I reviewed are 
geared to teaching you /-2-i; some are de- 
signed especially for Release 2, and others 
will be released in versions for Release 2. 
All deliver the basics, but some are better 
than others. 

LOTUS’S TUTORIAL When you buy 
1-2-3, you get Lotus’s own tutorial — at no 
extra cost. Lotus advises beginners to 
work through the instructions on the disk, 
A View of 1-2-3, and the 172-page book 
that accompanies it. Advanced users can 
use the disk tutorial alone and skip the 
book. 

A View of 1-2-3 is not much mote than 
its title suggests. Unlike the other on-disk 
tutorials I looked at, it does not teach spe- 
cific skills; it only shows what Release 2 is 
all about. The tutorial begins by introduc- 
ing the program’s main features, including 
the worksheet, graphs, and database, and 
then it briefly explains the functions and 
the commands. A second section then 
shows a sample session using a fictitious 
company to evaluate various business 
strategies like marketing and budgeting. 
Here you see many of I-2-3's analytical 
skills in action. The third part is devoted to 
the new features in Release 2: the string 
functions for text manipulation, the addi- 
tional financial analysis functions, hidden 
columns, and the new international for- 
mats coveting currency, numbers, date, 
and time. It also covers the new data com- 
mands, Matrix, Regression and Parse, and 
using passwords for security. 


The 1 72-page printed tutorial is written 
for beginners; it’s easy to understand even 
if you are new to computers. The sbt chap- 
ters give you the basics — how to build a 
worksheet, construct graphs, write 
memos, print reports, create a database, 
and use macros. Lotus suggests also using 
the reference manual that comes with 
1-2-3 for more information. Again, one 
clear advantage is that if you’ve got 1-2-3, 
you’ve got a customized tutorial without 
spending any additional money, 

OTHER ON-DISK TUTORIALS TAC- 
TICS for Lotus 1-2-3 from the Computer 
Tutor Cotp. and Lotus 1-2-3 Made Easy 
from QED Information Services are simi- 
lar to the tutorial packaged with 1-2-3. 
They’re also identical to each other except 
for the packaging and the price ($49.95 


■ Lotus’s own disk 
tutorial, A View of 1-2-3, 
is not much more 
than its title suggests. 


and $75, respectively). Both include a 
book and a data disk with files for practice. 
Both require you to work through the les- 
son book to create the worksheet and learn 
the commands, Lesson 1 familiarizes you 
with the spreadsheet, lesson 2 teaches 
functions and formulas, and lesson 3 intro- 
duces more commands. The remaining 
four lessons give good in-depth instruction 
on all /-2-i’s other features. But neither of 
these tutorials is any better than 1-2-3'% 
own tutorial; it makes little sense to spend 
money for training that just repeats what 
you’ve already got. 

TLS Lotus I -2-3 from TLS Software is 
a one-disk tutorial that includes the same 
subject matter as its competitors, but not 
with the same depth and not in color. It 
even fails to teach as well. Since it in- 
volves mostly instruction and little interac- 
tion on your part, any information you 
learn is hard to retain. Even at the low price 
of $49.95, you’re better off sticking with 
Lotus’s own tutorial — for free. 


^ FACT FILE 


A View cf 1^-3 
Lotus Develqiment 
Cop. 

55 Cambridge Pkwy. 
Cambridge, MA 02142 
(617)577-8500 
List Price: $495 (comes 
with 1-2-3. Release 2) 
Includes: Disk and manual 
Requires: 256K RAM. DOS 2.0ar later. 

In Short: This is the tutorial that comes with 
/•2-i. The disk is a view-only type lesson, 
but the book has a thorough, easy-to-under- 
stand-and-follow ^iproach. By creating an 
actual worksheet, you leam the ins and outs 
of the program. Copy }xo(ected. 
cTnaEaPI ON READER SERVICE CARD 



TACTICS for Lotus 
I-2-3 

Training Course Parts 
One and Two 
CcMnputer Tutor Corp. 
277 Unden St., #207 
Wellesley. MA 02181 
(617)237-1840 
List Price: $29.95 each; $49.95 the set 
Includes: One disk for both parts; work- 
book 

Requires: I92K RAM for Release lA; 
256K RAM for Release 2. 

In Short: This is similar to the tutorial that 
comes with Lotus’s 1-2-3 in that you must 
work through the manual to create a 
sheei and leam the commands. It also has a 
data disk with extra files with whkh m prac- 
tice and works with Release I A and 2. Not 
copyprotected. 

CIRCLE 602 ON READER SERVICE CARO 


TAcrrics’ 

fOH 

Loto l-2-;3'’ 

'IraifuaK Counc 


Lotus 1-2-3 
Lotus 1-2-3 
Lotus 1-2-3 

MADE EASY 

Lotus 1-2-3 
Lotus 1-2-3 


Lotus t-2-3 Made Easy 
QED Information 
Services 
QED Plaza 
P.O. Box 181 
Wellesley. MA 02181 
(617)237-5656 
List Price: $75 
Includes: Oie disk workbook 
Requires: I92K RAM for Release lA; 
256K RAM for Release 2. 

In Short: This is similar to the tutorial that 
cmies with Lotus’s 1-2-3 in that you must 
work tluough the manual to create a work- 
sheet and leam the commands, it also has a 
data disk with extra files with which to prac- 
tice and works with Release 1 A and 2. Not 
copyprotected. 


CnCLEm ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
310 









A View of 1 -2-3 is not a true disk tutorial because it jAoh j only some 
of the aspects of the program . Here it explains the new password feature 
of Release!. You can watch 1-2-3 in action, but you are not taught 
specific tasks. Those are covered in the Tutorial . 


PftVMEMTS 
1986 Budget 



Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep 


MONTHS 

B Purchases B Salaries U Rent Ml T; 


Combination book and disk courses require you to work with examples 
from data supplied. By following the instructions from TACTICS for 
Lotus 1-2-3 and QED's Lotus 1-2-3 Made Easy, you learn to construct 
slacked bar graphs like the one displayed here . 



FACT 


FILE 



TLS Lotus 1-2-3 
TLS Software Inc. 

2005 W. Cypress 
Creek Rd, 

Ft. liiudcrdale. FL 33309 
(305)771-2100 
LUt Price: S49.95 
Includes: One disk 
Requires: 128K RAM. EX)S 2.0 or later. 
In Short: A brief course in /-2-3. this bare- 
ly covers the basics and will not give you a 
gixKl working knowledge of a complicated 
program. It does mM cover Release 2. and 
TLS is not considering an upgrade. Copy 
protected. 

CinCUMMON READER Slavic- CARC 


l.Mm iDLAL Training 
for Lotus I -2 '3 
INDIVIDUAL 
Software Inc 
1 163-1 Chcs.s Dr. 

Foster City, CA 944(M 
(800)331-3313 
(415)341-6116 
List Price: $69.95 Includes: Twodisk.s 
Requires: 1 28K RAM, DOS 2.0 or later. 

In Short: .A disk-only program (hat uses a 
.simulation of /-2-i instead of the real thing. 
You have the i>plion of learning Release I A 
or 2. It is easy to wini ihn)ugh. and you can 
change the speed to move a little faster. Copy 
protected. 

C I QC'.r 605 ON REAPER SERVICE CARO 



INDIVIDUAL Training for Lotus 1-2-3 
from INDIVIDUAL Software Inc. offers 
you the option of learning Release 2 or Re- 
lease I A. A true disk tutorial with two 
disks and no book, it uses a mock-up of 
1-2-3 rather than the real thing. Designed 
for beginners as well as advanced users, 
the ten lessons on the disks are easy to run 
through. The program covers instruction 
for using the spreadsheet, commands, 
functions, formats, database, graphics, 
and macros in a colorful, efficient manner. 
A warm sense of humor incorporated in 
the lessons makes the learning process 
more fun. Also, you can change the speed 
to go through the lessons faster, and if you 
don’t care to view the current lesson, you 
can switch to one you prefer. An additional 
feature that software dealers may find at- 
tractive is the demonstration mode that 
continuously runs highlights of the pro- 
gram. 

SRA offers another book and disk com- 
bo, Using the Lotus 1-2-3 System. Step by 
step you read the manual, follow the in- 
structions on the disk, and input data when 
asked. If you’ve used 1-2-3 before, you 
can skip ahead to lesson 8 in the handbook 
and wotk on practical applications using 
the files provided. Currently, this tutorial, 
which covers all aspects of 1-2-3, works 
only with Release lA, but a version for 
Release 2 will be available soon. 

Geared specifically to teaching Release 


2, ATI Training Power: Teach Yourself 
Lotus 1-2-3 from American T raining Inter- 
national Inc. includes two disks, one for 
novices and the other for more-advanced 
users. A split screen shows the spreadsheet 
at the top and the instructions on the bot- 
tom, which guide you through the lessons. 
The exercises that follow the sections al- 
low you to practice skills that were recent- 
ly taught. You also get a quick-reference 
handbook for use with 1-2-3. This easy-to- 
use, well-planned program covers all as- 
pects of 1-2-3. 

UNUSUAL TUTORIAL The most un- 
usual tutorial I reviewed '\% All About Lotus 
1-2-3 from JNM Systems, written entirely 
on 1-2-3 worksheets and for use only while 
using 1-2-3. What makes All About Lotus 
1-2-3 different is that since it was written 
on worksheets, you can watch 
1-2-3 execute macro commands while you 
are learning. It consists of five disks, four 
with lessons and the last with worksheet 
models. Except for the disk with the mod- 
els, each has five complete lessons and a 
ten-question test. CurrenUy All About Lo- 
tus 1-2-3 works only with Release 1 A, but 
it will be upgraded soon for use with Re- 
lease 2. Working through this tutorial will 
unquestionably teach you 1-2-3. 

Fast Start Lotus 1-2-3 from McGraw- 
Hill Training Systems is a menu-driven 
disk tutorial that actually uses 1-2-3. It 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
311 






■ 1-2-3 LEARNING AIDS 


"J4U5B--6' XjotoJair 
■ iccerorth 


■I i2.m n.m :2,m mu n,m 

/ U 0 F K S H i E T 1 K S E F T aiJ D E 1 E I E 
In tMs exercise sou will use /Ibrlsbeet Insert anj /Itorlslieet Delete to; 

♦ Insert a ccluitn tor the nontli of narch 

• Deiere the jonecessars rou tetiee* Inoote anj E’sensss 

For loth of these operations, the steps are similar: 


0 TO BESIN fIClE M CELL POIltlEE TO COUJffl D 
TFT KfllN ... USE (I CUFSOE m TO TO FIGHT 


As with most disk tutorials INDIVIDUAL Training for Lotus 1 -2-3 walks 
you through the commands one at a time . Here it tells you when to make a 
selection and how to execute a worksheet command. This program uses a 
simulated worksheet instead of the real thing. 


ru'ii- i-.x IjS Ilvlslcn 


Ea:>.*j5a:s to rsTj -« ■ 
th? Lin’cfij oharactsr 
or FrssS ll. tfsn 5r*?; 



Some of the disk tutorials use a simulated spreadsheet with drop in 
windows. Macro instruction for Fast Start Lotus 1-2-3 is in the lower box. 
If you make the wrong selection, another window is placed on top with a 
correction. You are then able to proceed with the lesson. 


runs in color from two floppy disks and 
comes with a 66-page reference manual. 
As you work through the main menu, the 
program prompts you to load 1-2-3. Since 
the worksheet is the cornerstone of 1-2-3, 
Fast Start cleverly uses drop-down win- 


■ Most videos are 
designed to be 1-day 
courses, perfect for 
seminar presentations. 

dows on top of the worksheet to instruct 
you. You follow directions and read the 
explanations as it pulls you through the les- 
sons. If you enter an incorrect selection, 
Fast Sian prompts you for the right re- 
sponse. A nice touch to the tutorial is the 
checks that appear on the menu to show 
you what items you've completed. Fast 
Stan covers all the feature of 1-2-3, and 
it’s easy to follow. The only problem was 
that it froze with Release 2, but it worked 
well with Release lA. McGraw-Hill 
promises a new version for Release 2 
soon. 

Cdex-Intellisance Corp. offers a couple 
of tutorials on-disk. Teach Yourself Lotus 


1-2-3 and Advanced Training for Lotus 
1-2-3 Program are disk-based learning 
aids with one teaching disk and one data 
disk each and a booklet. Although pricey 
at $99.95 each, they cover all the basics. 
These tutorials do not yet reflect the 
changes in Release 2, but free upgrades 
will be available soon. The only nuisance 
was that the beginner's course. Teach 
Yourself, made so many disk accesses that 
the disk drive noise began to get to me. 

Advanced Training is not a continua- 
tion of Teach Yourself, but a refresher 
course in an entirely new format. Not a 
mock-up, it works in conjunction with 
1-2-3. It’s designed for users who are al- 
ready familiar with 1-2-3, and it’s great if 
you need just a quick brush-up. 

Watch 1 - 2-3 tv Videocassette-based 
learning systems can mimic tbe advan- 
tages of usually even-more-expensive 
classroom instruction. The drawback they 
share with audiocassettes is that there’s no 
one there to correct your mistakes or to an- 
swer your questions. If you didn’t get the 
message the first time, though, you can re- 
wind the tape and watch it again. A flaw of 
the videocassette approach to learning 
1-2-3 is that it can be difficult to read 
spreadsheets displayed on video monitors, 
but viewing the identical ones on your PC 
while you watch the tape partly remedies 
the problem. 


All in all, the advantages outweigh the 
disadvantages, and video programs can be 
an excellent way to learn 1-2-3. All the 



FACT 


FILE 


Using the Lotus 1-2-3 
System 
SRA 

I55N, WackerDr. 
Chicago. IL 60606 
(312)984-7110 
List Price: $75 
bidudcs: Book, one di.sk. 
Requires: I92KRAM. 

In Short: A book and disk tutorial, it covers 
Release 1 A but will be upgraded to Relca.se 2 
soon. Not copy protected. 

CIRCLE 606 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



ATI Training Power: 
Teach Yourself Lotus 
1-2-3, Relea.se 2 
American Training Inter- 
national Inc. 

1 26.^8 Beatrice St. 

Los Angeles. CA 90066 
(213)823-1129 
List Price: $75 Includes: Two disks 
Requires: I2SK RAM 
In Short: A well-planned program that cov- 
ers all aspects of Rclea.sc 2. This disk-only 
course uses a mock-up of the spreadsheet on a 
split screen. Not copy protect^. 
C1RClE607QNR£ADERS£RViCECARD ' 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
312 








C FEVERS 

lc\ becoming an epidemic . . . everyone is switching to C! . 


*»r*d now the rest the pm pranrim ing world. Progi 
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langu^'. plus a complete pix^am de\x*lopment ss-stem. Everything you need 
to master iIk* C programming language all at a price dial's less than tlie cost 
t>f a b<x)k! 

But don't let this price hxil you. Our .system Is powerful: it compiles mice as 
f;iM as the others, is completely standard, and it’s wry easy to use. Mo.st C 
compilers are designetl tor wizards We haw designed »>urs for you' 


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tiui supports all data types 
and the latest features like bit Helds, enumerations, .struaure assignment, 
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that Ituds sejiarately compiled file.s. searches libraries, and 
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(including the 

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vour programs for minimal .space or 

maximum speed. 

Operators are standing by . . . Please use this Number for ORDERS ONLYI 

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fk/r Technicut Support Please call h2I4’783-600I 

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Or contact our WorlduHde Distributors direct in: 


Split Screen Text Editor 






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The MSDOS/PCDOS version 
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. • Ext*cute any DO.S command or Rl .'N other 
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• (Quickly edit Hies a.s large a.s .-WO.CXX) 
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• Oimpile MIX C programs direaly fnim 
memory. The editor automatically ptisiiions 
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ASM UTILITY 


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CIRCLE 5M ON READER SERVICE CARD 



■ 1-2-3 LEARNING AIDS 



FACT 


FILE 


AU About Lotas I-2-3 
JNM Systems 
542 Village Dr. 

Edison. NJ 08817 
(201)572-3306 
List Price; $79 
Includes: Five disks 
Requires; I92K RAM 
Release I A: 256K RAM Release 2. 

In Sbort; A thorough disk-only tutocial that 
cuntntly tuns on Release 1 A but will soon be 
available for Release 2. On four disks you get 
20 lessons and a review test. Not co|>y pro- 
tected. 

anCL£SeSONHEADBtsetVICgCAHD 


Lota MO* 


Fast Start Lotas 1-2^ 
McGraw-Hill Training 
Systems 
P.O.Box 641 
Delmar.CA 92014 
(800) 421-0833 ext. 288 
(619)453-5000 
List Price: $79.95 
Includes: Two disks, reference manual 
Requires: 256K RAM, two disk drives, 
DOS 2.0 or later. 

In Shrrrt: A true disk-based tutorial that ac- 
tually uses 1-2-3. The colorful, easily under- 
stood lessons cover all the aspects of Release 
1 A. Not yet available for Release 2. Copy 
protected. 

CWtCL£ see ON HEXPER SERVICE CABO 




Teach Yourseff Lotus 1-2-3 
Advanced Training 
for the Lotus 1-2-3 Program 
Cdex-lntellisance Cotp. 

1885 Lundy Ave. 

San Jose. Ca. 95131 
(408)263-0430 
List Price: $99.95 each 
Incluiies: Two disks each, booklet 
Requires; I92KRAM. 

In Short: This is a good course for begin- 
ners, and Advanced Training is excellent 
for more-experienced users. These high- 
priced disk tutorials do not yet cover Re- 
lease 2. although a free upgrade will be 
available soon. Copy protected. 

CIRCLE StOON READER SERWCE CARO 



Relative and absolute formulas are an important feature of 1 -2-3 taught 
by all of the programs. Here, Teach Yourself Lotus 1-2-3 uses a drop- 
down window, over a simulated worksheet, to explain a relative formula. 


videos I reviewed 
ran at a good pace 
for beginners, and 
you can always re- 
wind and look at a 
lesson again. You 
can view the lessons 
by yourself or in a 
classroom setting 
with or without an 
instructor. Most of 
the products are de- 
signed to be 1-day 
courses, making 
them perfect for a 
seminar-type pre- 
sentation. 

The best of the 
videocassette offer- 
ings are from ITT 
SERVCOM: Intro- 
duction to Lotus 1-2-3 and More About Lo- 
tus 1-2-3 Commands. Each package 
comes with one tape, one data disk, and 
four booklets containing a workbook, a 
quick-reference guide, course-manage- 
ment information, and a command chart 
suitable for overhead projection. The 
course management booklet suggests three 
methods of conducting the Umning: inde- 
pendent study, group seminars, or a self- 
paced seminar. It explains the required 
materials and even the classroom setup, 
along with helpful hints for instructors. 


Introduction to Lotus 1-2-3, which has 
six lessons, starts with the basics for nov- 
ices and goes on to cover commands, func- 
tions, printing, and database management. 
After you look at each lesson on the 
screen, you're instmeted to pause, go to 
the workbook, and practice what you just 
saw, using files from the data disk. The 
easy-to-listen-to instructor gives you the 
feeling that he knows exactly what he's 
talking about. The videotape uses Release 
lA for demonstration purposes, but the 
lessons work just as well with Release 2, 
and the workbook 
explains any rele- 
vant differences. 

More About Lo- 
tus 1-2-3 Com- 
mands picks right 
up where Introduc- 
tion to Lotus 1-2-3 
leaves off and con- 
tinues with more on 
the advanced fea- 
tures of 1-2-3. Ex- 
perienced users who 
want to brush up on 
the more esoteric as- 
pects of the software 
are the ideal audi- 
ence for this pro- 
gram. It has seven 
sessions, covering 
recalculation and 
cell protection. 


h 1 Tl’ie luick fcrctfi fc aawa 



Disk tutoriais are interactive: you learn by making command selections 
on simulated worksheets. Advanced Training for the Lotus 1-2-3 Program 
has a quiz at the end of every section to help you review and test your 
knowledge. If you don ' t know the ansH’er. you can select H for a hint. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
314 











SmarlNotes unll 

revolutionize 

oomputerwork. 


Those sticky yellow notes 
have changed the face of many 
documents. Slap them on and 
they're sure to get noticed. Peel them 
off and your page is unharmed. 

Post-it’" Notes are great for paper- 
work, but what about computerwork? 

Introducing SmartNotes,’" a 
remarkably usefcl memory-resident 
program that lets you attach notes to vir- 
tually anything you see on your screen. 
Stick them to data base records, spread- 
sheet cells, and any phrase or passage in 
your word processor. 

We've invented electronic glue to bind 
notes in place. The glue sticks tight with- 
out becoming permanent. It’s general- 
purpose, so it works with all kinds of 


software. And it's non-toxic; your 
data files and programs aren't altered 
in any way. 

Touch a key and a note pops up. 
Capture an idea. Record a critical assump- 
tion. Remind yourself to verify a figure. 
Nothing slips through the cracks. And 
you can pass data via network or modem 
with notes attached. 

SmartNotes runs on any IBM™ PC, 
XT, AT, or compatible and needs about 
90KRAM. It works with Lotus 1-2-3,™ 
WordStar,™ dBASE,™ Sidekick™ and 
most popular software. 


Please send me copies of SmarlNotes at 

^.95 each plus (2.00 shifting ((12 outside USA 
and Canada). MA residents a^ (3.50 sales tax. 

Payment; VISA MC AMEX Diners Check 


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S)mptmty.^Mullplom''VmCtk.’'mdS4iprrCakS'’ pngrmm tie Sukttct'^ 


Tb Older, mall coupon or call toll-free. 

In MA 800-447-1196. Nationalh; 

800 - 445-3311 

P PEKSOMCS CORPORATIO.S 
2352 MAIN STREET 

CONCORD. .MA 01742 a'l/86 


Get SmartNotes and change 
the face of your computerwork. Just 
$79.95 and available now directly 
from Personics and at dealers 
nationwide. Not copy protected. 60 day 
money-back guarantee. 


CIRCLE 282 ON READER SERVICE CARD 






■ 1-2-3 LEARNING AIDS 



As with most disk tutorials, ATI Training Power Teach Yourself Lotus 
1 -2-3 prompts you for the correct response if you select the wrong 
command. In this lesson, it is teaching you how to format a range. If you 
do not make the proper choice, it will tell you to start with "C.” 


moving ranges, and worksheet status; file 
commands including Combine, Xtract, 
Copy, and Erase; 1-2-3's printing features; 
titles and windows; database capabilities; 
and commands available only in Release 
2. What keeps this course from being per- 
fect is the absence of instruction on graphs 


■ One clear advantage of 
audiocassettes is that 
you can follow the lessons 
at your own pace. 


and macros. ITT SERVCOM has three 
more products scheduled for release to 
remedy the problem, though: More About 
Lotus 1-2-3 Functions', Macros', and 
Graphing and Database. 

MORE VIDEO COURSES Anderson 
Soft-Teach also offers two video courses: 
Lotus 1-2-3 Introduction to the Integrated 
Spreadsheet and Lotus 1-2-3 Advanced 
Features, Both are on the short side, run- 
ning about 40 minutes each. Each comes 
with one videotape, a data disk with prac- 
tice files, and a training guide. For inde- 
pendent study, you watch a lesson and fol- 


low along in the 
training guide. At 
the end of each les- 
son, you stop the 
tape and use your 
PC to practice. In- 
troduction covers 
getting started, 
spreadsheet basics, 
commands, graph- 
ics, data manage- 
ment, and macros. 
Advanced Features 
continues with the 
same subjects, but 
in more depth. Its 
only drawback is 
that it’s not as com- 
plete as it could be. 
It will give you a 
working knowledge 
of 1-2-3, but you 
won't learn the finer points. 

Arthur Young's Lotus I-2-3Self-Teach- 
ing Video Course from Arthur Young 
Business Systems, an interactive video 
and computer-based training program, 
comes complete with two videocassettes, a 
data disk with 17 files, and an extensive 
workbook. Designed as a 2-day course, it 
takes about 14 hours to complete. The pro- 
gram has 18 lessons, including two case 
studies, and covers everything from the 
components of a microcomputer to ad- 
vanced functions. Only one subject is 
missing — macros. 

KITS FDR TEACHERS The most ex- 
pensive way to leam 1-2-3 is also the 
best — at your own PC with a capable in- 
structor following a course outline. An 
organized class led by a trained profes- 
sional can teach you and your staff quickly 
and accurately. The teacher can look over 
your shoulder to correct mistakes as you 
actually work with the program, unlike 
with disk or videotaped tutorials. If you 
have a group of people or an entire depart- 
ment that must be up and running with 
1-2-3 in only a short time, you can proba- 
bly justify the cost of this type of individ- 
ualized training. 

1-2-3 Courseware from Addison-Wes- 
ley Publishing Co. is a comprehensive kit 
made for instructors. The box contains a 
booklet for getting started, with sugges- 


tions for organizing and running a class. 
Three instructor’s workbooks cover the 
worksheet and graphics, database and 
macros. Also included are an overhead 
master for projection, a data disk, and even 
name cards and completion certificates. In 
addition, student modules that include a 
workbook and a disk are available for 


FACT FILE 



Introduction to Lotus /•2»J 

More About Lotus l’2’3 Commatuls 

m SERVCOM 

Tmining and Publication 

P.O, Box 29039 

PtKxinix. AZ 85038-9039 

(8(X)) 448-8669 (602)968-2699 

l.Lsl Price: $ 1 95 cadi 

Includes: Videotape, data disk. workbiMik 

Requires: VCR. 1-2-3 Retca-sc I A or Re- 

lea.se 2- 

In Short: A comprehensive program for 
learning I-2-3. The levsons are clear and 
easy to understand. This i.s the best of the 
vidc(X.'us.sclie courses. Not copy protected. 
CiRCLCSttONREADEnSERVlCECARD 


nonn TUTM oetM 

vnmn Ruwi. onoi 

Lotus' 

An IncradMim 

ID *r iMtfnMe 

Lotus 1-2-3 

Sdnncfe 


LtUus l•2‘3 Introduction 
to the Integrated Spreadsheet 
leOtus h2'3 Ad\'anced Features 
Anderson Sofl-Tcach 
2674 N. Rim St.. #100 
San Jose.CA 95134 
(408)434-0100 

List Price: S275 each: $475 for both 
Includes: Videotapes, data disk, training 
guide 

Requires: VCR. 1-2-3 Release I A or Re- 
lease 2. 

In Short: A rather expensive package 
when you consider the depth of coverage. 
You can leam 1-2-3 with this, but only the 
basics. Copy protected. 

CIRCLE 61 2 ON READER SERVtCE CARO 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
3I6 




Introducing the 10/6 MHz Multitech 900 
Innovation without compromise 



The high-performance Multitech 900 
is your innovative alternative in an AT 
system. 

Poised to run faster. 

The Multitech 900 operates at 6 or 
10 megahertz. With this speed ad- 
vantage switching from 6 to 10 
megahertz cuts processing time al- 
most in half — you spend less time 
waiting for the information you need 
to analyze. 


Bundled Soft-white display. 

A high-resolution, non-glare, soft- 
white display and monochrome- 
graphics adapter are included with 
your Multitech 900 — not priced 
separately. 

Price/performance 

breakthrough. 

At $2,395 the Multitech 900 delivers 
the high-performance you demand in 


an AT system but at an affordable 
price to fit within all budgets. 

Uncompromising. 

While the Multitech 900 introduces 
innovation it doesn’t compromise any 
industry standards. 

For example: Software compatibility 
with programs designed for the IBM 
PC/AT and PC/XT ; hardware com- 
patibility to tie into your networking 
options; full one-year warranty and 
guaranteed support from Multitech, 
a company with a proven track-record 
in quality microcomputer manufac- 
ture: and. Nationwide senr/ce'that is 
convenient and dependable. Call us 
today for more information about the 
Multitech 900 or our full line of per- 
sonal computer products. 

M /Multitech 

ELECTRONICS INC. 

Committed fo Excellence. Quality & Service 
1012 Stewart Drive 
Sunnyvale, CA 94086 
Tel: (408) 773-8400 
(800) 538-1542 

A Division of MSC International 
'Serviced Nationwide by TRW 
SEE US AT PC EXPO 
BOOTH 11 33 



CPU Speed 

Mother- 

board 

Memory 

Max. # of 
Half-HeisM 
Internal 
Drives 

Dliplay 

Operating 

System 

Warranty 

Period 

Suggested 
List Price 

MultItechBOO 

10or6MH{ 
Keyboard. Soft- 
ware or Hardware 
Switchable 

512K RAM 

Up to 1 MB 

S 

Hi-Res.. 

Soft-white 

MS-00S3.1 

12-Monlhs 

$2395 

IBM PC/AT 

SMHzOnly 

512KRAM 

Upto640K 

3 

Option 

Option 

12-Months 

$5295* 

Sperry PC/IT 

6.7.16or8MHz 

Hardware 

Switchable 

S12KRAM 

Up to 1 MB 

4 

Option 

MS-DOS 3.1 

12-Monttis 

S3395 

Compaq 

Deskpro286 

6 or 8 MHz 
Keyboard & Soft- 
ware Switchable 

256KRAM 

Upto2.2MB 

4 

Option 

Option 

3-Months 

$3395 

Tandy 3000 

SMHzOnly 

512KRAM 

Upto640K 

3 

Option 

Option 

3-Months 

$2599 

Televideo 

Telecat-286 

6 or 8 MHz 
Keyboard & Soft- 

51 2K RAM 

Up to 1MB 

3 

Hi-Res.. 

Green 

Option 

3-Months 

$2995" 


wareSwitcfiable 


■Includes 30MB Hard Disk Drive All prices reflect rrtanulacturers sugoesled MuNnwe goo n a rnwwrv or Munitecn Eaetroncs m 

’ 'IfKludes 20MB Hard Disk Drive list (or base models as o( June 4. 1986 ai orner groeurt nvnM ire irMemjnK ot inew respective minuticture<s 


CIRCLE 175 ON READER SERVICE CARD 





■ 1-2-3 LEARNING AIDS 


about $35 each. Complete coverage is giv- 
en on all subjects, in an organized and 
thoughtful manner. 

Que Corp. makes two instructor's kits 
for 1-2-3: Using 1-2-3 Instructor's Kit, a 
beginner’s course, and 1-2-3 Macros In- 
structor's Kit, for more-experienced users 
of the spreadsheet. The beginner's pack- 
age comes with Que’s book entitled Using 
1-2-3. a workbook, two copies of a data 
disk, and an instructor's guide. Student's 
kits for this in.structor's course are sold for 
about $59 each. 


PC 


■ Arthur Young’s Lotus 
l-2‘3Se(f-Teoehmg 
Video Course 
Arthur Young Business 
Systems 
P.O. Box 38 
Oakhursl.NJ 07755 
(800)524^25 
(201)493-8031 List Price: $399 
Includes: One disk, two videocassettes, 
workbook 


Requires: I92K RAM Release 1 A; 256K 
Release 2; 1-2-3. VCR in VHS, Beta 1. Beta 
II. or U-maUic fornuus. 


In Short: An easy-to-follow course that cov- 
ers all the subjects except macros. It is de- 
signed as a 2-^y program and requires you 
to watch the vidra and practice on your PC. 
Copyprotected. 

CinCL£ til ON READER SERVICE CARO 



Courseware 
Addiscm-Wesley 
Publishing Co. 
Reading. MA 01867 
(617)944-3700 
List Price: Instructor’s 
kit. $150; pack of five 
student modules, $175 


Includes: Instructor's Kit; Worksheet A 
Graphics Instructor's Guide. Database In- 
structor's Guide, Macros Instructor’s 
Guide, overhead transparency masters, 
leaching poster, completion certificates and 
name cards 

Student Module; Worksheets A Grapfucs 
(workbook with disk). Database (w^book 
with disk). Macros (wofkbotA with disk) 
Requires: 1-2-3. Release 2. 

In Short: A complete instruction kit on how 
to teach 1-2-3. it includes all the subject mat- 
ter and information to organize and lead 
classes. Not cc^ protected. 

CIRCL£ai40N READER SEBVtCC CARO 


il' [IflSJ 'i, SaiS IllCPKSE 





i'lTi'iiL rf:-’!::!: 

i?63 1554 155! 155: 155" 15:5 

2C'i' 2:4 OW 25C’ 4W 515 442' :!l ::4 ::: !46 

II .11 .11 ii 1.1 11 

1:0 000 150 500 202 245 214 ::: 22" 24: 240 :!l 


50.000 “5 200 55 l!2 105 0!" 124 1:5 14! 542 


Introduction to Lotus I -2-3 and More About Lotus 1 -2-3 Commands are 
the best of the videocassette offerings. After you view the lesson on the 
video monitor, you practice with the same file from the data disk, actually 
using 1-2-3. 


The macros 
course includes 1-2- 
3 Macro Library 
from Que, a work- 
book, a data disk, 
and an instructor's 
guide. Student's 
kits, which cost 
$62, include a book, 
a workbook, and 
two copies of a data 
disk. Both these in- 
structor's guides 
give complete infor- 
mation on how to 
prepare a 1-2-3 
course from plan- 
ning to presentation. 

Each also includes 
transparency mas- 
ters for overhead 
projection. The ma- 
terials in both courses can help anyone 
who wants to teach a course on 1-2-3 get 
started. 

LISTEN TO THIS A less-expensive op- 
tion for learning 1-2-3 is to listen to an au- 
diocassette program. One clear advantage 
is that you can follow the les.sons at your 
own pace. With earphones, you can work 
at your PC without disturbing anyone, and 
no noise interferes with your study. Plus 


you can review the lessons as many times 
as you wish. 

An in-depth course on audiocassettes is 
available from Fliptrack Learning Sys- 
tems, //ow/o Use Lotus 1-2-3. You simply 
load 1-2-3. slip on your earphones, and 
start the lesson. Fliptrack's tape talks you 
through four training sessions, each run- 
ning 2 to 3 hours. It takes you through all 
of 1-2-3's commands, functions, and for- 
mats — ^and, best of all, you can push the 



Keyboard templates may not teach you how to use 1-2-3, but they can help reinforce what you've 
learned. The one on top. from TDA Inc., includes a booklet with commands. The other, from SMA 
Inc., has the commands written on both sides. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
318 





#156 

arrive? 
me up? 

brunette in a trenchcoat. . . and nothing else. 
playing Interlude again! 


Maybe I can catch an earlier flight. 

Please do. 

Interlude II. The long-awaited sequel to the first adult 
computer game in history is finally here. It's provocative and 
playful! Outrageous and romantic! It has all the excitement 
of the original Interlude, plus significant new features. 

The computerized interview, which is taken by one or 
both players, has been greatly expanded. It probes your in- 
nermost desires to discern your mood of the moment, your 
secret longings, your special fantasies, and then suggests for 
your pleasure one of its more than 160 Interludes. You can 
ask the computer for an Interlude for now. or one for later. 

Special options give each player added control over 
surprises and special erotica hidden in the Interludes. 

The original Interlude took the computer world by 
storm six years ago. creating a media sensation: 

FORUM Magazine: "The Interludes are imaginatively 
and sensitively written . . . the computer's recommenda- 
tions are uncannily appropriate " 

US Magazine: "The most edifying third party to 
join couples between the sheets since The Joy of Sex." 

Chicago Tribune: “This marriage of computer 
technology and sex is natural . erases forever the image of 
computer-users as dull guys with slide rules in their pockets 
and square roots on their minds." 

Money Magazine: “Sometimes it’s easier to tell a computer 
what you want than it is to tell your partner. “ 

Interlude II will take you to the outer limits of fan- 
tasy and romance. And. if the computer selects Interlude 


#99 your love life may never again be the same. 


Interlude II. Are you ready for it? 


Send yoor check or charge information to: 

INTERLUDE, 1K)ll Richmond. Suite 600. Houston. TX 77042 

MAIJP 

PCM 

ATF 

AnnoF^^ 


rrrv stbtf 7ip 


fHARrjr n j<rmMn« mi i«t tinw hfrf 


MASTOICAfa} V6A AMEX ACCOUNTNO 

-EXP DATE 


CHARGE CUSTOMERS: 

1-800-752-7001 ext. 829 

(in 1^as call 1 •800-442-4799 ext 829) 
Available for IBM (PCjr PC. XT or AT)' or 
cofnpatibles. 

'l^adernarlQ of Intemabondi Business Machines Corporation 


$ 39.95 Interlude II 

- srippirvg ($3.00 or 
$I0X)0 outside U.SA.) 

• TX residents add 6'/*% 
sales tac-$2.45 
$ ^ TOTAL 





■ 1-2-3 LEARNING AIDS 



FACT 


FILE 


Using 1-2^ lnsbvcU^*s 

deni kit: workbook, S29.9S; Using 1-2-3, 
S19.95; data disk. $9.9S) 

Indudcs: Using 1-2-3. Using 1-2-3 Work- 
Inn^. Using 1-2-3 Workbook Instructor’s 
Guide, two disks 

Requires: I92K RAM. two disk drives, 
printer (optional), color monitor (optional). 
In Short: A kit for teachers who want to lead 
classes in 1-2-3. This covers all the subjects 
required to teach and complete instructions 
on how to get started. Co^ protected. 

ClRaE1»0NI=CAD£HSERV>C£CAft0 


F2-3 

MACRO 


1-2.3 Macrm Instruc- 
tor’s KU 
QucCofp. 
7999KnueRd. 
Indianapolis, IN 462d0 
(800)428-3331 
(317)842-7162 
LIK Price; $173 (Sni- 
dentldl: workbook. $32.93; I -2-3 Macro U- 
brary. $19.93; data disk, $9.93). 

Includes: 1-2-3 Macro Library, 1-2-3 Mac- 
ro Workbook, 1-2-3 Macro Workbookln- 
struaor's Guide, two disks 
Requires: 236K RAM. two disk drives, 
printer, graphics monitor (optional). 

In Short: A kit for teachers who want to lead 
classes in 1-2-3, This covers all the subjects 
required to teach and complete instructions 
on how to get staited. Copy protected. 
anCLEeteONREADERSERVKiaCARD 


How to Uu Lotus 1-2-3 
Riptrack Learning 
Systems 

999 Main St., #200 
Glen Blyn.lL 60137 
(312)790-1117 
List Price; $89 
Includes: Four audio- 
cassettes. lesson summary 
Requires: Cassette player, Lotus 1-2-3, Re- 
lease IAot2. 

In Short: An in-depth course that covers alt 
the features of /-2-i, Release IAor2.These 
audiocassettes provide over lOhoursofin- 
struclion. 

CIRCLE SITON READER SERVICE CARO 





HOWTO 

un 

LOTUS 

1-8-8 


rewind button to hear it all again. Optional 
material is on the flip side of the tape; you 
simply set the digital counter to 0, turn the 
tape over, listen to what you want, then re- 
wind to 0 and flip back to the Tirst side. 
How to Use Lotus 1-2-3 also includes les- 
sons on the graphics and database features 
of /-2-i. 


CRIB ALL YOU CAN Desktop refer- 
ences and keyboard templates can help 
you make sure you don’t forget what you 
know about using 1-2-3, They're also 
good crutches and timesavers — better 
even than the Lotus I -2-3 Quick Reference 
manual open to the right page. They save 
you a search through the manual. And 
these aids are easy on your budget. 

Systems Management Associates’ PC 
Documate is a two-piece plastic template 
that fits over your keyboard. Both pieces 
are labeled with 1-2-3 commands as well 
as macros, functions, graphing, special 
keys, and menus. TDA Inc. makes a top- 
of-the-keyboard template; in addition, it 
has a small book attached to it, listing all 
the 1-2-3 commands. Microref Quick Ref- 
erence Guide from Educational Systems is 
both a keyboard template and a colorful in- 
dex that you set up next to your computer, 
encapsulating everything you need to 
know to run 1-2-3. 

Making A CHOICE Selecting the most 
appropriate learning aid may be as difficult 
as mastering 1-2-3 itself. Before you buy, 
ask yourself a few questions. Do you re- 
quire a cra.sh course in basics, a gentle in- 
troduction to the program, an intensive 
seminar in all procedures, or a quick re- 
fresher? Do you need another disk tutorial 
similar to the one that comes with 1-2-31 
Do you prefer to use the spreadsheet pro- 
gram while using the learning aid? Is an in- 
teractive tutorial best for your needs? Does 
your budget prohibit investing in an expen- 
sive program? Do you have a large group 
that needs to learn 1-2-3, and if so, would 
investing in a system designed for instruc- 
tors be cost-effective? Will more people in 
your company need to learn 1-2-3 in the 
future, making a videocassette tutorial that 
you can play at any time more desirable? 
Do you have the necessary equipment or 
required personnel? Do you prefer to work 
alone or with others? 


FACT FILE 


PC-Documate Keyboard Template 
Systems Management Associtfes 
3325 Exeetttive Dr. 

P.O. Box 2(X)25 
Raleigh. NC 27612 
(919)878-3600 
Lbt Price: S14.95 

In Short: A handy two-inece reference that 
you place on the keyboard. It has all the l-2‘3 
conunands viridun view. 
gnCteeiaONFCAOER SERVICE CARO 


Lotus 1-2-3 Keyboard Template 
TDA Inc. 

445A (^isle Dr. 

Herndon, VA 22070 
(703)437-4148 
List Price: $19.95 

In Short: A helpful tool that sits on your key- 
board. 

CIRCLEeieON HEADER SERVICE CARO 



MicnJtef Qidck Reference Guide to Lotus 
1-2-3 

Educational Systems Inc. 

1000 Skokie Blvd. 

Wilmette. IL 60091 
(800)323-6043 
List Price: $19.95 

In Short: A desktop reference that sits 
next to your PC. It has a colorful index with 
all die commands and functions. 

CIRCLE 842 ON READER SERVICE CARO 


Most people can use all the help they 
can get when learning a new software pro- 
gram. The cost of your time usually offsets 
all or most of the expense — as long as what 
you’re buying delivers what you need. A 
good training aid is one that's easy to use, 
progressive, and comprehensive. 1-2-3 
has spawned a variety of such training pro- 
grams. One or more of them can be your 
key to unlocking the spreadsheet’s power 
without too much pain. 


Christopher Barr, A music industry execu- 
tive. resides in the New York City area. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
320 




OURNAL 




327H79 RMI IATION 


EXPANDED MEMORY 


5-0 DR\uns(; wrm .mega (add 


Focus on the technical issues that concern 
in PC TECH JOURNAL 


Let's face it, even’ day brings new technical chal- 
lenges with the IB.M PCL And just when you think 
you've met them all, >’Ou'll find out that IB.M has just 
introduced DOS 3, 1 — or the new networking stan- 
dard is likely to be the IBM token ring. 

Where can you turn for accurate and in-depth 
answers to the technical questions that confront you 
daily? PC TKCH JOURNAL, 

PC: TECH JOURNAL focuses on the technical W'hat- 
if s and how-to's that aro crucial to the growth of P(; 
systems, 

PC, TECH JOl'RNAL will give you a clear picture of 
products and technical de\ clopments with detailed, 
objective articles on data management, applications 
det elopment. communications, and programming. 
PLUS, you'll receit’c hard-nosed product evaluations 


of both hardware and software. 

'^'our subscription to PC fECH JOURNAL 
includes the special PC TECH JOURNAL Direc- 
tor)' issue, a comprehensive guide to IB.M/MS 
D()S products and index to Pt: TECH JOURNAL 
articles! 

Subscribe now and save 50% on the magazine 
that puts technical issues into focus. PC TECH 
JOURNAL. One year(13 issues)only $26.70. To 
subscribe, please use the attached Order Card, 
or call 1-800-852-5200 for fast service. 

Savings ba,sed on annual single-copy price of 553 -35. 


Consult with 
the Experts. 


OURNAL 


8ZC59 






Finally, a Multi-User 
Solution Easy as 



A. Plug in 
the cable... 


C Turn on 
the switch. 


B. Plug in 
the power... 

The Power of a $5,000 Computer 
for Only $795. Once you’ve purchased 
the basic MultiLink' System, additional 
workstations are only $795, each. But, instead 
of getting a cheap PC -clone, you get a top- 
quality workstation that’s able to tap the power of the 
Sperry PC/IT, MultiLink' Systems’ host computer. 

The PC/IT was recently quoted by InfoWorld as being 
“53% faster, offering greater mass storage (44 Megabyte 
hard disk), and accommodating more users than the 
IBM PC Ar 

A PC-DOS Compatible System Designed by 
the Experts. In 1981, we were the first company to 
make PC-IXJS multi-user. To date, no one else has met 
the challenge 

Lotus, dBASE 111, WordStar, & WordPerfect are just a 
few of over 3,000 programs available today for multiple 
users in a MultiLink’ Advanced environment. 

The Easiest Part About a MultiLink' System 
Is Picking Up the Phone Call The Software Link 
TODAY for complete information and the authorized 
dealer nearest you. Our basic three-user system is only 
$8,595, and comes with a money-back guarantee Addi- 
tional workstations are $795, each. 


Without a 

method of sharing information is out- 
dated and expensive 

It’s a fact. 

Because a true multi-user system lets you 
share data, hard disks, printers, and even programs 
among a multitude of users. 

Which saves you a lot of money. 

With MultiLink' Systems, youll also save time 

A COMPLETE System You Can Install in 30 
Minutes. Forget about the headaches of choosing the 
proper pieces of your system... our experts already did it 
for you. Then they put it together. That saves you even 
more time 

Think of it! No boards to install and no lengthy hard- 
ware documentation to decipher. In fact, you can even 
select the software you want, and well install it right on 
your system’s hard disk. 

Our basic three-user system, for example comes com- 
plete with a Sperry PC/lT, a 44 Megabyte hard disk with 
DOS and MultiLink' Advanced already installed, two 
Wyse 60 terminals, and two Megabytes of memory. Lit- 
erally everything you need to start your own multi-user 
system is included. 


Sy stems 


From the Developers of MultiLink* Advanced & LANLink** 


CD 


THE SOFTWARE LINK, INC. 


8601 Dunwoody Place, Suite 632, Atlanta, GA 30338 Telex 4996147 SWLINK 


THE SOFTWARE LINK, INC./CANADA 
250 Cochrane Drive, Suite 12 Markham, Ont. L3R 667 
CALL: 416/477-5480 


MultiLink' isansgiawredlradamark 
OITheSoftiwaraLink.Inc MufliLink' 
>V)vancM. LANLinktu S Mull>L>nk ’ 
SyilamB ara trademark! ot The 
Softnosre Link Inc 
Price! A Technical Specifications 
sut>|ect to change 



Dealer Inquiries invited 

CIRCLE 392 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



IBM. PC. AT. & PC-DOS ere 
trademarha ot IBM Corp Sperry. 
Wyse. Lotus. dBASE. Wor dP erTect 
AMbrdStar are trademarks of Sperry 
Corp . Wyae Technolagy, Lotus 
□evetopmeni Corp . Aahlon-ltaee. 
Wordnrfect Corp . A MicroPro. 

retpecinrely. 




■ SOFTWARE ■ VINCENT PUGLIA 


Software Safety Nets for 

HARDDISK 


D 'AT' A 


You’re courting 
disaster if 
you’re not using 
a backup 
system with your 
hard disk. Is 
there an alternative 
to costly — and 
often bulky — tape 
backup units? 
Yes: backup 
software. 


unning a hard disk 
without some kind 
of a backup system 
is like playing 
Russian roulette 
with a two-shot 
derringer — either 
you’re safe or you 
blow it all away. Sure, you say, you'd love 
to splurge on a tape backup/hard disk unit, 
but you've already exhausted this year's 
hardware budget. You feel you have no 
choice but to risk your data on a hard disk 
without a backup system. 

Not so fast — there is a software alterna- 
tive for backing up hard disk files. Besides 
costing considerably less than a hardware/ 
tape backup system or even a plug-in tape 
unit (the programs we evaluated range in 
price from $39 to $180), backup software 
offers two advantages many subsystems 
lack: flexibility and expandability. 

Many of the 1 1 backup programs we 
evaluated recognize any legal DOS de- 
vice, whether it’s a floppy disk, hard disk, 
removable hard disk, RAMdisk, LAN, or 



a tape backup unit if it is so initialized. 
Some hardware backup subsystems, on 
the other hand, perform operations only 
between the hard disk and the tape. So if 
you buy a Bernoulli system, for example, 
you may not be able to transfer the fdes 
you’ve already backed up to it. The soft- 
ware solution, though, enables you to use a 
backup program with your current hard 
disk. Later, when your budget allows, you 
can buy whatever device you want, includ- 
ing a tape unit, and transfer all your fdes. 

Since DOS supplies backup and restore 
commands, why clutter your disk with a 
separate utility? For some users, DOS 
commands are sufficient. DOS’s backup 
and restore utilities are simple but func- 
tional, Because the syntax of BACKUP 
and RESTORE resembles that of COPY — 
the major difference is the options — these 
commands are easy to use. The options 
permit backing up by date, directory, and 
archive bit. You can also specify that files 
on the target floppy disk are not to be 
erased. 

The one feature that DOS’s RESTORE 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1985 
323 


■ BACKUP SOFTWARE 


Backup Software: Summary of Features and 

I The 1 1 software backup programs and DOS 3. 1 were 
I compared on features and ability to back up and restore 
a 9.77-megabyte ( lO-million-byte) text file. Program execution 
was timed from when the last command was entered until con- 
trol of the computer was regained, including the time for swap- 
ping floppy disks (about 4 seconds per swap). Reported below 
is die number of bytes backed up divided by the time required 
(bytes per second), and the number of floppies needed. 

Two of the programs had problems with the test. BackRest 
crashed because it required more storage space on the hard disk 


Performance 

during operation than was available; the BackTrack program 
files could not fit on the hard disk with the test file. 

Fastback u,ses a proprietary format and automatically refor- 
mats (loppy disks as part of the backup process; when the test 
was run using disks already formatted in the Fastback format, 
backup time was reduced by more than 100 percent. 

While Fullback was most efficient at backup and Fastback 
best at restore, the two results balance out and they're tied on 
overall efficiency. But ease of use, not speed, was the main cri- 
teria in selecting the Editor’s Choices. 



TARGHS BACKUP RESTORE TYPES OF OTHER 

SUPPORTER FEATURES FEATURES BACKUP FEATURES 



oos 

$85 

■ ■ 

■ 


■ 


■ ■ 

■ 


■ 

■ 

■ N/A 

■ 

■ 

■ 


■ 

■ 


KeepTrack Plus 

$39 

















■ 


[53 Jet 

$60 






■ 











■ 


DS Backup 

$69.95 
















■ 

■ 


Fullback 

$88 

■ ■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 


■ 


■ 

■ 

■ 

■ N/A 

■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 

■ N/AIM 

■ 


Sav Key 

$89.95 

■ ■ 

■ 


■ 

■ 

■ ■ 

■ 


■ 


■ 

■ 

■ 





■ 

TakeTwo 

$115 


















■ 

DataCare 

$129 


■ 


■ ■ 

■ 

■ ■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 

■ N/A 

■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 


BackTrack 




















Fastback 

$179 ■ 

■ 


N/A 

■ 


■ N/A ■ 

■ 

N/A 

■ 


■ 

■ 

■ 

■ 


■ 

■ 


Bakup 

















■ 

■ 

■ 

BackRest 

$180 




















N/A~fx)t applicable. ‘Supported in future version. — Indicates Editor's Choice. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
324 



Choose from a family of 4 modems — the 1 200 baud modems at$l 39 &$1 49, 
and the 2400 baud modems at $299 — that offer unbelievably great 
performances and make you wonder why everyone else charges so much! 


UNMIMhi 

Int*rn«l Modem: Two Jackt, Lio* Input and Phoo* Jack, HS>232 Port COMl 
or COM2. Spaakar with Volum* Control 

Extamal Medan: 8 Status lodicstor Lamps, Snap Off Front Switch Panal, 
Spaakar with Voluma Control 

Beth UnilK BaU 103/212A 300/1200 Baud, FvUv Kayaa "AT'Command 
Sal Compatlfaia. Itodular Phona Cor^ PC-TALK III Soi^ara 


24NBai NsdMB 

Intaroal BCodam: Modular Phona Cabla, Mounting Bracket. COMl or 
COM2. Asynchronotu Communications 

Extamal Medan: AC Power Ad»tar, Stand Alone Enclosure, Status 
Indicator LEDs. Asynchronous Communications 

Both Unite: Hayaa Compatikla Command Sat, CCITT V.22/V.22 bis and 
Bdl 212A Compatibla 110/300/600/1200/2400 bps Operation. Auto- 
matic Adaptive Equalisation. IBM PC Hardware CompatiUa Two RJ-llC 
Jacks (Alternate Volca/Data Communication) 



You can be sure that the Qubie' family of modemB 
are of good stock. Our latest editions, the 24001 
Internal Modem Card and 2400E External Modem 
are proof positive what good breeding can 
accomplish. These 8tate>of-the-art modems are 
CCITT V.22/V.22 bis, BeU 212A Compatible, and 
2400/1200/600/300/110 bps. 

Our modems are fully compatible with all Hayes 
software commands. Software packages such as 
Crosstalk, Smartcom II, and Sidekick will work 
flawlessly. Both the 24001 and 2400E are equipp>ed 
with Automatic Adaptive Equalization which 
automatically adjusts to the telephone line and 
increases performance and decreases the error 
rate. 

The 24001 Internal Modem Card fits into any 
expansion slot, as it is a compact half*card 
mc^em. It's designed specifically to operate in the 
IBM Personal Computer PC/XT/AT family and 
compatible computers. The rear panel has two 
N-llC modular telephone jacks for the telephone 
line and the telephone set. The modem can be set 
for COMl or COM2. The 24001 modem allows 
asynchronous communications with remote com* 
puters and other data terminal equipment over 
standard voice grade telephone lines. The 2400E 
External Modem offers the user asynchronous or 
synchronous communications, tibe 2400E is en* 

If you ar« not eoraplatoly Mtlstiod with your purch«M. you may raturn it 
within 30 daya oi purchaaa for a comply rwund. Including tha eeat to 
aand it bac k. U you can gat any daalar os cempMitof to giva you t^ aama We 
MS iMHim buy both and raturn tha ona you don't Uka. 




For laataat dalivary, land eaahiar'a chack. money order, or order by 
MaatarCard/Vlaa. Paraenal Chacka allow 16 daya to clear. Company 
purchaaa ordara aceaptad. call for prior authoriiation. California raaidanta 
add 6% aalaa tax. 


closed in a slimline plastic enclosure. The front 
panel displays the eight modem status indicator 
lights. It works on any computer or terminal with 
an RS-232C serial port. 



Not to be forgotten are our 300/1200 baud 
modems. The Internal Modem Card is designed 
for the PC, PC/XT and most compatibles; it 
occupies one full length slot and the internal 
speaker lets you know the call progress. An 
RS-232 serial port is standard, COMl or COM2; 
you can use the port for other peripherals when 
the modem is not being used. Our External stand 
alone modem can be used with any computer or 
terminal which utilizes an RS*232C serial port. It 
also comes with 8 status indicator lamps and a 
snap off front panel that allows for quick setting of 
the switches for all types of communication 
packages. At $139 and $149, these are the best 
price/performance modems for most commu- 
nications. 

I ■ mm. -u 

I 

Everything, if it's a Qubie' supported product. We 
at Qubie' stand behind what we sell. Our 30-Day 
"No Risk Guarantee", our one year warranty and 
48 hour turnaround on warranty repairs are proof 
that our products are of the highest quality. 

Departmant P 

S07 Call# San Pablo 

Camarillo. California 93010 

laald* California Outaida California 

805 - 987-974 1 800 - 82 1 -4479 

London fOl) 223-4S66 Sydnay (02) 576-3322 
Paria (01) 321-8316 Canada (403) 434-9444 


Koura; M - F 6 am • 5 pm PTZ Sat 6 am • 12 am PTZ 
CIRCLE 235 ON READER SERVICE CARD 









■ BACKUP SOFTWARE 


command contains and many of the pro- 
grams reviewed here lack is the screen 
message indicating that system fdes were 
restored. (Some programs, like DalaCare, 
will not back up system files.) If the sys- 


tem files are restored in a different loca- 
tion, you may not be able to reboot the sys- 
tem from the C: drive. 

A dedicated backup program is gener- 
ally friendlier, faster, and more flexible 


than DOS’s commands, though. Fast- 
back, for example, can back up a 10-mega- 
byte disk in less than 10 minutes, given 
ideal circumstances. BackTrack automat- 
ically backs up your files while the pro- 
cessor sits idle. KeepTrack Plus performs 
extended DOS services in addition to 
backup and restore operations. TakeTwo 
displays extensive information on its 
progress while it backs up and restores. 

TWO IMPORTANT FEATURES 

When purchasing a backup program, you 
should consider two features above all 
else: reliability and ease of use. If a pro- 
gram backs up your disk in 2 seconds but 
cannot restore it properly, money and 
time were spent for nought. If the pro- 
gram is difficult to use, it will probably 
gather dust. Since time is money, speed 
or the ability to operate in the back- 
ground should also rank high on a list of 
desirable features. While speed and reli- 
ability are measurable, ease of use for 
backup software involves a combination 
of features such as interface, legibility of 
backups, and help. 

A few of the programs reviewed here, 
like Fullback and Jet, are strictly com- 
mand driven. While they generally re- 

■ A dedicated backup 
program is generally 
friendlier, faster, 
and more flexible than 
DOS’s backup 
commands. 


quire less overhead and are usually flexi- 
ble and powerful, their main drawback is 
that they lack help screens and other 
fringe benefits like automatic formatting 
and an estimate of the number of floppy 
disks needed. On the plus side, they Ire- 
gin processing the instant you issue the 
command. Menu-driven programs, on 
the other hand, generally require you to 
answer endless prompts before they tell 


INTRODUCING 


SafetyNet 


From The Cmior* of PuthMirndtr'’ 


Revolutionary New File Recovery System 
For the IBM PC and Compatibles 

A ASS ’’ shipping 
and handling 


Accidental Pile erasure is no trivial 
matter! There are two kinds of users - 
those who have accidentally erased 
an important file, and those who will! 

SafetyNet^ is a file recovery program 
designed to recover those files or sub 
directories of files which have been 
accidentally erased. Unlike programs 
such as Norton’s UnErase, SafetyNet^ 
is a preventive measure rather than an 
attempt to cure the problem 
after-the-fact. What if you 
accidentally Reformat your Hard Disk? 
SafetyNet'" will restore it with only S 
keystrokes! 

Recent surveys have revealed that, on 
the average. 3.6 persons have access 
to each computer used in corporate 
America. It might be four or five days 
before the victim discovers that their 
files are no longer available. When 
several people use a computer, or a 
single user operates more than two 
hours per day. there are two chances 
that a utility such as Norton’s Unerase 
will recover the missing file(s) - slim 
and none! It is highly likely that the 
file’s space will have been 
overwritten in the interim (an 
impossibility with SafetyNet'"). 


It is our belief that when one has 
accidentally erased a file their 
anxiety is high - and that’s not the 
time to learn a new technology. With 
some utility’s multi-layered menus, 
and the admonition that their system 
doesn’t always work, anxiety becomes 
near panic and increases chances for 
additional operator error causing loss 
of the vital information forever! 

SafetyNet'" requires the user to do 
three things: 1) Type "SN" at the > 
prompt. 2) Marie the files presented on 
the screen, 3) Press the Enter Key. 
That’s it! No need to know about 
sectors, clusters, bits or bytes. No 
requirement to replace the first letter 
of each previously erased file - a 
simple, foolproof manner to end the 
panic which comes when files are 
accidentally erased. 

SafetyNet'" works first time, every 
time. Regardless of the time span 
between the actual erasure and 
discovery, there is no danger that the 
allocated file space will be 
overwritten. thus rendering the 
recovery doubtful or impossible. 
SafetyNet'" - a Space-Age utility 
with a no nonsense user interface. 


To order, call toll free (800) 628-2828 ext. 555 or conuct: 


WESTLAKE DATA CORPORATION 


P.O. Box 1711 


(512)4744666 


Austin. Texas 78767 


DON’T BOOT UP WITHOUT USf 


CIRCLE 153 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
326 




you to “Please Insert a Diskette in Drive 
A:.” Some programs, like Bakup, DS 
Backup, and DalaCare, offer both inter- 
faces as well as support for batch files. 

The programs vary in the amount of 
information they supply on-screen. 
BackRest. which produces error reports 
that you can print, displays only the num- 
ber of the disk it just completed backing 


■ Bakup, DS Backup, 
and DataCare offer both 
command- and menu- 
driven interfaces as well 
as support for batch files. 


up. TakeTwo gives you the estimated and 
actual time for the backup or restore; the 
names, number, and location of files be- 
ing backed up; and the percentage com- 
pleted. Many programs also include re- 
porting features. The most rudimentary 
form is simply a listing of which files 
were backed up to which volumes. Oth- 
ers. however, include such statistical in- 
formation as the number of files and 
bytes in each directory. 

While the vast majority of backup 
programs produce backed-up files that 
are readable and executable, the directo- 
ries are not always the same as those on 
the hard disk. TakeTwo, for example, 
groups files into directories such as 
"TT_MARI5.0I0," and Bakup uses a 
code based on the backup sequence. As a 
result, knowing which file is in which di- 
rectory without first looking at a report or 
a catalog can be difficult. Of course, 
such schemes are far more reasonable 
than that used by Fastback, whose disks 
even TheNonon Utilities won’t read. 

Other features some backup programs 
offer include protecting backed-up files 
from accidental erasure by setting the 
read-only attribute, requiring confirmation 
before overwriting files, and providing se- 
quenced labels for floppy disks. While 
none of these features is absolutely neces- 
sary, they add to a program's appeal. 


The Only EGA 




A fully compatible 256k EGA card with a parallel 
port for only $259, If you buy any display card: 
Color, Monochrome, Hercules, or EGA, without 
reading this ad, you’re probably throwing away a 
lot of money. 


BT/EGA Enh«nc*d Gmphics Ad«pt«r 
256k oi memory, and parallel printer port. 
Works with all standard IBM displays, 
and compatible displays. 

5 1 50 Monochrome Di^sy: Both text and 
640x350 bit mapped graphics. 


8183 Color Display: 640x200 and 
320x200. 

8184 Enhanced Display: Color 640x350 
16 simultaneous colors from a palette oi 
64 


I A Clear Upgrade Path | 

This really is the only display 
board you may ever need. Regard- 
less of what monitor you buy today, 
this card is a clear upgrade path for 
the future, and the best choice 
today, even if you are only going to 
use a Monochrome Display. This 
means one board today does 
monochrome 640x350 bit mapped 
graphics and text, and provides a 
clear upgrade path to 640x350 
Enhanced Color Display with no 
change of display board. It also 
runs with the 640x200, 320x200 
Color Display. 


I Killer Featuret I 

All boards come with a full 256k of 
memory, and a parallel printer 
port. That means no extras for later, 
and 16 simultaneous colors dis- 
played from a palette of 64 colors, 
and crisp clear text on both Mono- 

No Sisk GnarantM 

li you ar« not complataly Mlialiod with your 
purchM*. you may raturn it within 30 day* of 
purchaa* tor a complete refund, including the 
coel to aend it back If you can get any dealer or 
competitor to give you the earn* I* Hih (aei 
buy both and return the on* you don't like 




For faateat delivery, aend caahier'a check, 
money order, or order by MaaterCard/Viaa 
Peraonal Check* allow 18 day* to clear 
Company putchaae order* accepted, call for 
prior authoruation California resident* add 
6% sale* tax 


chrome and Enhanced Color Dis- 
plays - features or options that are 
not available on other EGA boards. 
Since all your current software will 
run, you're set for today, and 
prepared for the standard of the 
future. 


iTh' 


ay Uea 

Of course many of you will want to 
take advantage of the EGA card 
right away, so we are offering a 
special deal when you buy the 
board together with a Basic Time 
HR 31-350 monitor - you get both 
for just $749, or the card only for 
$259. This means that you can 
equip all your PC's now and in the 
future with displays and EGA cards 
and get the Qubie' "No Risk 
Guarantee", our one year warranty, 
and 48 hour turnaround on war- 
ranty repairs. The price is the whole 
price, there are no extras for freight, 
insurance, or credit cards. 


QUBIE' 

Department P 

50/ Call* San Pablo 

Camarillo. California 93010 

In*id* California 

805-987-9741 

Outside California 

800-821-4479 

London (01) 223-4569 Sydney (02) 579-3322 
Pan* (01) 321-5316 C:anads (403) 434-9444 

Hour* M-F Bam - 5p m PTZ 
Sat Sam - 12pm PTC 


PC MAGAZINE 


327 


CIRCLE 238 ON READER SERVICE CARD 
AUGUST 1986 




■ BACKUP SOFTWARE 


PROBLEMS? NOT TOO SERIOUS 

Although a number of programs indicate 
that IBM’s DMA (direct memory access) 
chip may present problems, only one — 
DataCare — points out and explicitly cor- 


rects an undesirable side effect of IX)S’s 
RENAME command. When you RE- 
NAME a file, say from OLD. TXT to 
NEW.TXT, DOS does not set the archive 
bit. If you should then create a new file 


with the name OLD. TXT, a modified 
backup will back up the new file as 
OLD. TXT and exclude the old file 
NEW.TXT from the backup. As a result, 
you no longer have a valid copy of the 
original backup. 

Surprisingly, only two programs re- 
viewed here altered the AUTOEXEC- 
.BAT files. BackTrack was justified in do- 
ing so, since it was designed to mn in the 
background. Sav Key, on the other hand, 
renames your original batch file and then 
writes a new one that includes only the 
date, the time, and a command to execute 
Sav Key. 

A more serious problem is copy protec- 
tion. Fastback, Bakup, and BackTrack are 


■ uses the key- 

(iisk approach to copy 
protection; others use the 
install/uninstall theory. 
But who’s kidding whom? 
Any copy program can 
break the protection. 


copy protected (TakeTwo used to be copy 
protected but no longer is, and Tallgrass 
has announced that BackTrack won’t be as 
of July I). Fastback uses the key-disk ap- 
proach; the others follow the install/unin- 
stall theory. But who’s kidding whom? 
Any copy program (such as CopylPC and 
Copy Write) can break the protection. In 
fact, for one of the above-mentioned pro- 
grams, you don’t even need a nibbler. If. 
during the uninstall process, you should 
happen to hit Ctrl-C just after the program 
increments the system disk and before it 
wipes itself off the hard disk, you end up 
with a full complement of installs on the 
system disk and a working copy of the pro- 
gram on the hard disk. That single extra in- 
stall may be the difference between restor- 
ing your files and waiting by the mailbox 
for a replacement disk should the program 
go south three times. 


Don't you deserve the same 
hard disk backup protection 








as GM, GTE, 3M, 

GE, UPS, FORD, 

CHRYSLER, 

WESTINGHOUSE,'^e 
POLAROID, SHELLV^ 

MOBIL, JOHNSON >*' 

& JOHNSON, PROCTOR & GAMBLE, 

THE UNITED NATIONS, MERRILL LYNCH,' 
PAINE WEBBER, ROCKWELL INTERNATIONAL, 
HEWLETT PACKARD, WELLS FARGO BANK & 
the CATERPILLAR TRACTOR CO? 

We think so. 

Thats why we created DSBACKUP, a powerful hard disk software utility designed to 

quickly backup and restore any 
or all files from an IBM 
PC/XT/ AT or compatible 
computer, non-IBM compatible 
MS-DOS computers, and the 


DSBACKUP CAPABIUTIES 

/ 

YES I 

NOT COPY PROTECTED | 


YES I 

Up to 10X faster than DOS 


YES I 

Automatic estimate of media needed for backup ' 


YES I 

Backs up to any logical device 


i— - T— 1 

YES 1 

Completely menu or command line driven 


YES 1 

Backup partial or entire hard disk 


YES 1 

Murapte filespec inclusion & exclusion 


YES 1 

Disk formatting from within DSBACKUP 



Restore all or select group of backed up riles 

YES 

Backs up to/trom removaMe cartridges 



YES ] Macintosh and MacPlus. 


lmpK>rtant companies trust their 
important data to DSBACKUP 
. . .should'nt you? 

CALL NOW 
TO ORDER: 
1-800-231-3088 

1-312-231-IS40 
In Illinois or Alaska 

only $69.95 

MS-DOS is a TM of Microsoft, Inc. 
Macintosh & MacFlus are TM's of 
Apple Computer, Inc. 


Design Software, 1275 W. Roosevelt Rd., West Chicago, IL 60185 


CIRCLE 509ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
328 


KeepTrack Plus 

The Finol Group’s KeepTrack Plus differs 
from the rest of the programs reviewed 
here in that it is actually an extended DOS 
services program (for a discussion of its 
other capabilities, see “Extending DOS’s 
Capabilities,” PC Magazine, Volume 5 
Number 9). You can therefore perform 
your hard disk housekeeping and never get 
to see that enigmatic DOS line. Best of all, 
KeepTrack Plus does it all without sacri- 
Ticing necessary backup and restore capa- 
bilities. While KeepTrack Plus may not 
boast as many bells and whisUes as other 
programs, it is speedy, reliable, easy to 
run, and very inexpensive. 

One of the program’s stronger features 
is its flexibility in file selection. In addition 
to recognizing wildcards, the program lets 
you scroll through the directories and tag 
the files you wish to back up. While this 
process may sound tedious, KeepTrack 
Plus's graphic tree actually makes it sim- 
ple and quick. 

Some of KeepTrack Plus's features are 
not as elegant as they might have been had 
the program been completely dedicated to 
backup. To get an estimate of the number 
of floppy disks needed, for example, you 
need to check the program’s status win- 
dow and then hunt through the wealth of 
information about your system to find 
what you want. If you want the files to be 
verified, you must set DOS’s verify option 


^ FACT FILE 


l^ftpTrackPlus, 

The Finot Group 

Palo Aho.CA 94306 
(800) 628-2828. ext. 700 

List Price: $39 plus SS handling 
Requires: 256K RAM, hard disk drive, 
floppy disk drive. 

In Short: A ^)eedy. reliable program set 
apart by its origins in exterxled DOS services, 
KeepTrack Plus is easy to run and inexpen- 
sive but best for a personal , not corporate . 
setting. Not copy protected. 

CWCLEasaONReADCRSERVlCgCARO 


CIRCLE 236 ON READER SERVICE CARD 
PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
329 


Hard Solntions 



Expanding your PC to include a 20 Megabyte 
hard drive has never been simpler with Qubie’ 
internal or HardPack 20 slot mounted drives. 


unit for UM In fl^pT 4i«k atm ei « PC PC J 
er eempAttbl*. 

HardpMfe Card Mount for slot soounting, \/2 
•let lAogth to nount behind floppy dnvo. en • 
PC, PC n or eoBpntiblo. 


DaU TrAnafoi RAto: 
AeoM* Time: 

Power lUqulrAmeota; 

CApacltr: 

RAlUbtUty: 


S MevebiU/Sec 
65 MUIlAACoa^ 

♦S VDC 2.0 A 
n2 VDC .OAMas 
20MAeAbrfoi 
14.000 Houn 


|Th» P»nUQon Ashtia^ 

The military is famous for paying 
$450 for ashtrays. A lot of com- 
panies are asking the same kind of 
outlandish sums for a hard disk 
mounted on a card. You get a hard 
disk, a controller, and a bracket, 
and they charge you hundreds 
more than you pay for a Qubie' 20 
Megabyte hard disk system. Unlike 
the others, our HardPack 20 fits 
into a single slot and nestles in 
behind your floppy drives. If you 
buy any other hard drive, you may 
simply pay more and get a whole 
lot less. 


\ The Choice I 

We offer both types, an internal 
mounted like your floppy, or a card 
mount for the same $499 price. 
Let's face it, the bracket doesn't cost 
us 450 bucks. While some people 
prefer the standard mounting, (like 
a floppy) so they can see the 
read/write light, others want a card 
mount so they can use both floppies 
they now have. Both drives boot 
directly from the hard disk, and 
require no software patches. They 
run all the popular software, and 

No Sisk Guraitee 

U you are not complataly •atitiiad with your 
purchaaa, you may loturn it within 30 dayt ei 
purchaaa for a eomplata refund, including the 
cotl to tend it back If you can get any dealer or 
competitor to give you the aame IM iHrmtai. 
buy both and return the one you don't like 


VISA 


For faatest delivery, send caahier'a check, 
money order, or order by MaaterCard/Viaa 
Per*onal Cbecka allow 16 dayt to clear. 
Company purchaae ordera accepted, call for 
prior autborUalton CaUtornia reaidenta add 
6% aalea tax. 


are low power. Our format software 
allows changeable interleaving that 
gives you noticeable speed 
improvement over the standard XT 
drive. Both have the ability to run a 
second drive from the controller, 
(Part Number 2nd-20HP $399), 
giving you 40 megabytes of stor- 
age for under $900. 


I The Goodit | 


We give you some software that 
really enhances the use of a hard 
disk. Idir is the hard disk organizer 
that really makes DOS a snap, and 
our special Qubie' version of 
Zylndex, the super searcher is 
also included. E^sy to read manu- 
als make installation a snap. Of 
course the drives are back^ by our 
"No Risk Guarantee", our one year 
warranty, and 48 hour turnaround 
on warranty repairs. The price is 
the whole price; there are no extras 
for freight, insurance, or credit 
cards. Order part numbers PC20 
for IBM PC and compatibles. PC20- 
1000 for Tandy 1000, or HardPack 
20. By popular demand we still 
offer the matching ashtray for just 
$450, (Part No. PCKIDDING). 


QUBIE' 

Department P 

507 Celle San Pablo 

Camarillo. California 93010 

Inaide California 

805 - 987-9741 

Outalde California 

800 - 821-4479 

London (01) 223-4569 Sydney (02) 579-3322 
ParU (01) 321-5316 Canada (403) 434-9444 

Houra: M-F Sam ■ Spm PTZ 
Sat Sam • 12pra PTZ 





Visual COBOL. $li;0. 
Contact mbp today, and learn the 
art of Visual COBOL. 

‘^'(800) 231-6342 

In California, call 


(800) 346-4848 


COBOL programming has just been elevated to an art form thanks 
to Visual COBOL from mbp. litis comprehensive COBOL compiler 
package gives you mainfi^e screen management cm^ilities for 
your IBM PC. As a result, Visual COBOL turns your color display 
into a canvas on which you can create professional data entry 
screens and a very visual user inters. 

Hie heart of Visual COBOL is an interactive mask editor that 
encourages an artistic aj^roach to screen design. By extending 
ANSI standards and providing full text editing capabilities. Visual 
COBOL allows you to create your own ma^rpiece using a hill 
palette of foreground and background colors. You can easily move, 
insert, or delete fields; create an unlimited number of windows; 
even add eye-catching screen animation. In addition, Visual 

I/O fiel(f definitions in real time. 



Once you add the final touches to your screen design, the 
mask editor automatically preserves your work of art in a separate 
screen library. At the same time, a WORKING-STORAGE definition 
is created for your mask. It’s that simple. 

Visual COBOL gives you the screen management capabilities 
you need. It can make the difference between ordinary software, 
and software that sells. Just as important. Visual COBOL increases 
vour productivity b\’ saving you valu^le time in both the desi^i 
and coding stages of program development. What's more, saeen 
modifications can be done without recompiling the program, so 
maintenance is easy. 

In addition to providing impressive artistic capabilities. Visual 
COBOL also gives you high-speed native 8086 machine code, a 
lightning quick SORT, extended CHAlNing features, a new 
interactive d^u^er. execution of DOS commands, multi-keyed 
ISAM structure, ANSI compatibility. GSA certification, and much 
more. N^rsions that support XENIX. UNIX, and both the IBM and 
Novell networks are also available. 

lb fijily appreciate the screen management capabilities of 
Visual COBOL, you must see it on your own PC. So. for a limited 
time only, mbp is offering qualified COBOL programmeis the 
opportunity to receive a comprehensive demonstration disk that 
illustrates the creative potential of this powerful compiler, lb find 
out if you qualifir' for this offer, simply mail the coupon below or 
call mbp's toll-fi^ number. 


IHM ts a (radmuric of IHM (Mp 
Novell Is a irailrm.-irk of Novell Coip 
XENIX IS a trademark of MKrosufi ( j>rp 
I'NlXisatrademarkofXT&T 


Please send me more informalion on 


mf^ s Visual COBOL compiler. Name 


mbp Software and Systems Company 
TKhnology, Inc. 

ll.M Harbor Bay Parkway. Suite 260 Address 
Alameda. California 94501 


Cib 


Zip 


II3TI 


Phone 


CIRCLE 223 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


■ BACKUP SOFTWARE 


before running the program. 

If you are looking for a standard pro- 
gram to back up your personal PC or XT, 
KeepTrack Plus is probably the best value 
for the money. But it doesn't really offer 
enough features for the kind and volume of 
backup often required in a corporate envi- 
ronment. 

Jet 

Jet is the command-driven transfer utility 
that comes with Tall Tree Systems’ popu- 
lar Je/t/nve. a RAMdisk program. Al- 
though Jet is not a backup program in the 


■ yef offers what most 
users look for in a backup 
program: flexibility, 
reliability, and an 
easily learned syntax. 


usual sense, its flexibility, reliability, and 
available options have made it the backup 
method of choice of many Jetdrive users. 

Besides the usual options for backing 
up by date, archive bit, and subdirectory. 
Jet has a number of unique settings. Two 
of these, exception and mandatory, come 
in very handy when you perform regularly 
scheduled backups. Other useful options 
include copying only those files that ap- 
pear on the target floppy and transfening 
non-DOS zero-length files. The former 
option allows you to update backups. Jet 
also enables you to create a list of files that 
need to be transferred en masse. That op- 
tion was a real timesaver when I was trans- 
porting all the individual files for this arti- 
cle back and forth to and from PC 
Magazine Labs. 

Jet does have one minor flaw: when re- 
storing files you press Enter to continue a 
restore and the space bar to kill the opera- 
tion. Becau.se the space bar is so large, you 
can hit it quite easily when you don’t in- 
tend to. 

Jetdrive, the main program on the disk, 
creates up to four RAMdisks. While you 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
330 




FACT FILE 



Jet, Version 3.3 
Tall Tree Systems 
1 1 2U San Antonio Rd. 
Palo Alio. CA 94303 
(415)964-1980 
List Price: S60 
Requires: I28KRAM. 
two floppy disk drives, 

In Short: A command-driven transfer utility 
that comes with (hcJetdrive RAMdisk, Jet 
offers flexibility, reliability, and unique 
backup option.s. Not copy protected. 

CIRCLE 661 ON READER SERvlc^ CATO 

OS Backup. 

Version 2.4c 
Design Software 
2 N . 520 Prince Crossing 
Rd..#16 

West Chicago. IL60185 
(312) 231-4540 
List Price: S69.95 
Requires: 128K RAM. DOS 2.0or later 
In Short: Design Software's DS Backup is 
an acceptable, reasonably priced backup and 
restore program that unfortunately may force 
you to relearn some basic concepts. Not copy 
protected. 

CIRCLE 850 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



can create a RAMdisk with most memory 
boards, you need a J-RAM board to access 
its full capabilities. Jetdrive's greatest fea- 
ture, though, may be its ability to survive a 
warm reboot. 

Jel offers what most users look for in a 
backup program: flexibility, reliability, 
and an easily learned syntax. 

DS Backup 

Design Software’s DS Backup includes 
most of the standard options, such as back- 
ing up by directory, file, and archive bit. It 
also offers both menu and command-line 
interfaces. In spite of (or maybe because 
of) its menu interface. DS Backup has cer- 
tain idiosyncrasies, however, that make it 
a little harder to use than other programs. 

DS Backup's menu selections are not 
always intuitive; that is, they do not always 
reflect what you think they should. The 
most distressing example is the way the 
program labels the source and the destina- 
tion. In all other programs the source is 
where a file resides, and the destination is 
where it is going. While this is true for the 


backup operation in DS Backup, the oppo- 
site is the case during a restore; then, coun- 
terintuitively, the source is the hard disk, 
and the destination is the floppy disk. The 
screen does point out this aberration, but 


that fact does not forgive the mislabeling. 

While DS Backup produces readable 
backups, it saves all the files within a file 
named DlSK_NO.* where is a num- 
ber. Each file is coded at the front of its 


Is your AT looking for 640K? 

TDPHAT'S" 

GOT YOU COVERED! 



Doift be limited by 2S6K or S12K on yoar system bosni access the fuU 640K . . .with TophAT. 

TophAT is tfw conventional memory board fw PC ownere who require the ATs full capaaty. 

It is availaUe in two configurations: 128K for tf>e enhaikced PC AT arwl 3MK (or tfw base AT 

EASY INSIALLAHON. Our Owner’* Mvnul b one of the least ^ 

read in the irtdustry. VVhyt Because lb^\AT b a sn^ to iretall. 

Ireert into an oc sen ]6'bjt bus. Atm run the PC AT Sehs Progra m 
Oocatcdon the IBM PC AT diagr>oslk3«hskette). Reset the AT and 
dte entire 640K of RAM b available. 

REUABUTTY. IbphAT b backed ^ a oneyear warranty and a 
staff of qualified engineer* with design escperience from sum com- 
panies as IBM. Miaosoft. and Quadnm. 

TOMAT for the FUTURL u memory above 640K b needed 
in the future. IbphAT can co-reside with memory cards 

which access memory above the 640K DOS limit. 

For adcMonal InfomatfaM, 
ask yo«r Bou Ites sa idi dcakt or rantact ss directty: 





0BDCn 

RESEARCH, INC. 

6MI Gagni Amt, Boca Ratoe, FI U451, 
(305)997-8227 


Suggested Retail Prtces: 

$145 $195 

128K 384K 


SPEOFICATICmSi 
COMPATWUnr DM PC AT 
SPEH7: OpnWw with «MHi or SMHt CPlTi 
SIZEi SJ* X 4J* 

POWER: 4-S viAiOC 
fCC Om B Apiinmd 
MADE M THE USA 


CIRCLE 382 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
331 



STATE 

Tech PC Desktop Computers are de- 
signed for survival. The XT's leave your 
desktop looking comfortably empty 
with their slim non-obtrusive profile; 
The AT's give you a powerful presence 
with a clean lined sturdy chassis. Com- 
bined with a 14 inch, 800 by 400 line 
amber monochrome monitor or a 14 
inch, 1280 by 800 black and white 
monochrome monitor you've got State 



OF THE 

of the Art staring straight back at you. 
If 8 MHz 80286 power isn't fast enough 
for you ... try the Tech Turbo PC/AT 
with its lOMHz 80286 and 10 MHz 
80287 math co-processor socket. The 
Tech Turbo PC/AT gives you the 
strongest, most powerful 802^ perfor- 
mance available from anyone, 
anywhere. . . available with up to 16 
megabytes of memory and hard disks up 


TECH PC DESKTOP COMPUTERS are available now in 4 
different base models: 

TECH PC/Xr DESKTOP $529 

Options: 

Tech PC/XT with 20MB Hard Disk $979 

Tech POXT with 20MB Hard Disk, Monochrome Monitor, 
Hercules^® Compatible Mono/Graphks Card $1179 

TECH TURBO POXT DESKTOP $629 

Options; 

Tech Turbo PC/XT Desktop with 20MB Hard Disk , . $1079 
Tech Turbo PC/XT 20MB Hard Disk, Monochrome Monitor, 
Hercules® Compatible Mono/Graphics Card $1279 




ART DESKTOPS 


to 1 gigabyte with our new optical stor- 
age disk, the Tech Personal Computer 
Desktops represent the cutting edge of 
desktop microcomputer technology. 

Tech Personal Computers, Inc. is a 
full service manufacturer of Micro Com- 
puter Products and offers a complete 
line of Desktop, Portables and Multi- 
User Computer Systems as well as an 
accessory line of over one hundred 


enhancement products. Tech Personal 
Computers, Inc. are all backed by a full 
one year warranty with additional 
maintenance coverage and extended 
maintenance contracts available 
through Momentum Service Corp. For 
more mformation concerning hundreds 
of Service Centers throughout the 
United States, contact Tech Personal 
Computers, Inc. at (714) 754-1170. 


TECH PC/AT DESKTOP $1399 

Options: 

■ Tech PC/AT with 20MB Hard Disk $1799 

■ Tech PC/AT with 20MB Hard Disk, Monochrome Monitor, 

Hercules® Compatible Mono/Graphics Card $1999 

TECH TURBO PC/AT DESKTOP $1599 

Options: 

' Tech Turbo PC/AT Desktop with 20MB Hard Disk . . . $1999 
' Tech Turbo POAT with 20MB Hard Disk, Monochrome Moni- 
tor, Hercules® Compatible Mono/Graphics Card .... $2199 


All TECH PC DESKTOPS available with tape backups, hard 
disks up to 1 gigabyte, networking systems, and hundreds 
of other hardware and software accessories. 




TEGMPQ 714 / 754-1170 

2131 South Hathaway, Santa Ana, California 92705 
Tfelex 272006 Answer Back -TECH FAX: 71415568325 


CIRCLE 505 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




NOW 
YOU CAN 
TAKEIT 
WITH 
YOU 
WHEN 
YOU GO! 



Tech Personal Computer Systems are de- 
signed and manufactured by Tech Personal 
Computers . . . The leader in quality, performance 
and state of the art computer system engineer- 
ing. . .each of our portable, desktop, multiuser, 
and minicomputer systems are unparalleled in 
the industry for quality construction, dependable 
operation, complete software compatibility, and 
an unbeatable combination of product satisfac- 
tion guarantees, long warranty periods, and com- 
prehensive third party maintenance. 

At Tech PC we're out to capture your micro- 
computer business. No one matches our diverse 
tine of high performance products, or our com- 
prehensive system of support, warranty, and 
third party maintenance service options. Tech PC 
is a large Southern California computer design 
and manufacturing firm with computer research 
and design specialists, productions engineers, 
technical assistance staff, qualified sales person- 
nel, and a strong management and investment 
team to provide you with state of the art products, 
state of the art reliability, and state of the art 
economy. 

PORTABLES 

Tech PC Portable Computers come in four 
different base models to match your computing 
needs. Our entry level Tech PC/)^ portable com- 
puter is designed to provide a non-obstructive 
profile, and has a capacity to hold two thirty 
megabyte hard disks, a high resolution mono- 
chrome monitor with a Hercules compatible 
graphics card to drive it with 800 by 400 lines 
resolution, and never before heard of 6 expan- 
sion slots in a portable computer. If 4.77 MHz of 
Intel 8088 power isn't fast enough, try our Turbo 
4.77 to 8 MHz 8088-2 or optional NEC V-2 
microprocessor based portable machine. De- 
signed to increase speed up to 170 percent of a 
standard PC/XT, this turbo gives you the edge. 
The Tech PC/AT and Tech Turbo PC/AT portable 
units are state of the art in portable performance. 
The 80286 microprocessor based units can be 
fitted with up to 240 megabytes of high speed 
voice coil hard disk technology, and with the 
Turbo AT's 10 MHz math co-processor socket and 
10 MHz 80286 microprocessor the unit can 
manipulate large spreadsheets with unparalleled 
performance. 




TECH PC PORTABLE COMPUTERS are avail- 
able now in 4 different base models: 


TECH PC/XT PORTABLE $899 

Options: 

Tech Turbo PC/XT Portable with 

20 MB Hard Disk $1349 

Tech Turbo PC/XT Portable with 

1200 Baud Internal Hayes 

Compatible Modem and 20 MB 

Hard Disk $1549 

TECH TURBO PC/XT PORTABLE ....$999 
Options: 

Tech Turbo PC/XT Portable with 

20 MB Hard Disk $1449 

Tech Turbo PC/XT Portable with 

1200 Baud Internal Hayes 

Compatible Modem and 20 MB 

Hard Disk $1649 

TECH PC/AT PORTABLE $1799 

Options: 

Tech PC/XT Portable with 20 MB 

Hard Disk $2199 


Tech PC/XT Portable with 1200 

Baud Internal Hayes Compatible 

Modem and 20 MB Hard Disk $2399 

TECH TURBO PC/AT PORTABLE .... $1999 
Options: 

Tech PC/XT Portable with 20 MB 

Hard Disk $2399 

Tech PC/XT Portable with 1200 

Baud Internal Hayes Compatible 

Modem and 20 MB Hard Disk $2599 

All TECH PC PORTABLES available with tape 
backups, hard disks up to 1 gigabyte, network- 
ing systems, and hundreds of other hardware 
and software accessories. 

Tech Personal Computers, Inc. 

714 / 754-1170 

2131 South Hathaway. Santa Ana, California 92705 
7^10x272006 Answer Back -TECH FAX: 71415568325 



CIRCLE SOI ON READER SERVICE CARD 


SimplifyComputing 



by Imperial DataSystems, tnc. 
Friday • May 16, 1966 
12:06 pm 


jj A Accounts Payable 

1 BACKUP • Hard Disk (complete) u 

6 Budget Department Sub Menu 

2 BACKUP • Hard Disk (mod. hies) 

jj C Communicatmns 

3 Directory - Drive A II 

D Data Base Management System ^ 

4 Directory • Drive B 

E Electronic Spreadsheet 

5 Format Diskette in Drive A !! 

,1 Q Ger>eral Ledger 

6 Formal Diskette In Drive B u 

II R Graphics 

7 Speller >i 

P Personnel Department Sub Menu 

J| M Project Management 

T Tutorial • Electronic Spreadsheet 

W Word Processor j 

8 Thesaurus jj 

II 

Select Option (press arrow ksys or chsractar to left of desired option). 

Then press the Enter Key CT. 

Serial Numt 

Press F1 Key for Utilities Menu. 

»er:SOOOOO 




PathMaster ^ simplifies the use of 
computers— especially systems with 
high-capacity disks {AT diskettes, hard 
disks, removable cartridges). Eliminates 
need to learn DOS commands, allowing 
you to concentrate on the job at hand. 
PathMaster' provides menu-driven 
prompts to DOS functions and addi- 
tional DOS utilities. 


• Single keystroke access to ^ _i- i 
these programs. 

• Single keystroke access to 
SubMenus (sub-listings). 

• Autoload feature simplifies adding 
programs to menu. PathMaster ’ 
finds the program regardless of its 
location (sub-directory) on the disk. 


A disk/file management system. 

• Whole disk file search and file 
management (not available at DOS 
prompt). 

• Copy, rename, erase files with no 
knowledge of DOS. (PathMaster '* 
prompts for required information- 
no need to refer to DOS manual), 

• Periodic File Clean-Up utility makes 
it practical and easy to purge disk of 
unnecessary files. 

Create and remove disk sub- 
directories with no knowledge 
of DOS. 

Full-screen editor provides 
easycreation and editing of 
small batch and note files. 
Optional password access to these 
disk/file management utilities and 
'-•5?*, functions. 

Not Copy Protected 

Minimum hardware requirements IBM PCrXT/AT or 
true compatible DOS 2.0 or greater 256 Kb BAM 

For more information, call 914-592-4120 


Features: 

A highly flexible user-designed 
Program Selection Menu System. 

• On-screen menu of all of the soft- 
ware programs on disk. Menu 
appears when computer 
is turned on and 
reappears whenever a pro 
gram is terminated (no need to 
deal with DOS prompt). 



Imperial DataSystems, Inc. - 45 Knollwood Road - Elmsford, NY 10523 

Name 


Comoanv Name 

Phone ( ) 





Check Money order 

Mastercard Visa Exoiration date 

Charqe arcounl number 



Charge Customers Order Toll Free! 
1-800-341-1950 Ext. 95 
30 Day Money Back 
GUARANTEE 

If you're r>ot completely satisfied that PathMaster * 
can do everything for you that we've said it can do. 
we'll refund your money 


Quantity x S69.95 = S • 

NY residents add sales tax ■ 

Total enclosed $ • 

Includes shipping and handling. Outside U S add 
SiO-00 payable by bank draft in U S dollars drawn on 
U S bank NO COD’S pru 


■ BACKUP SOFTWARE 


data. DS Backup keeps the directory and 
catalog information in a separate file on the 
last disk of the backup session. 

DS Backup also suffers from a crowded 
manual that has little white space and illus- 
trations that are too small. The program is 
worth its $69.95 price, but you can find 
better backup programs on the market. 

Fullback 

Alps Software’s Fullback consists of four 
program files in one package: Fullback, 
DIRimage, CTLback, and Bigback. Full- 
back backs up files that can fit on one flop- 
py diskette. DIRimage creates the subdir- 
ectories. CTLback creates a control file for 
excluding files or directories, including 
specific files, and setting the destination 
target’s root directory. Bigback handles 
the files that must be split. While Full- 
back's lack of a unified front end prevents 
you from backing up a hard disk in one fell 
swoop, the individual programs them- 


LfeyPACT FILE 


Fullback, Version 2.2 
Alps Software 
1502CountiyRd.,#25 
Woodland Park. CO 
80863 

(303)687-1442 
List Price: $88 
Requires: 128K RAM. 
two floppy disk drives. 

In Short; Actually a transfer utility consist- 
ing of four separate program files, Fullback 
offers comm^-line (^ration, powerful 
user-selected options, and low overhead, but 
it's not for those suffering from DOS-phobia. 
Not c<^y protected. 

CIRCLE 60 ON READCR SERVICE CARD 



Sav Key, Version 2. 1 
Business Pro 
P.O. Box 44075 
Phoenix. AZ 85064 
(602)996-6547 
List Price: $89.95 
Requires: 64K RAM. 
hard disk drive, flc^y 
disk drive. RESTORE.COM and BACKUP- 
.COM. 

In Short: An inelegant front end for DOS’s 
backup and restore prograras. 5av Key in- 
volves more pnxressing time and a lot of disk 
swapping. Not copy protected. 

CIRCLE 648 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



CIRCLE 360 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


336 



selves are extremely useful and powerful. 

Because Fullback is actually a transfer 
utility, you perform a restore by reversing 
the drive letters on the command line. Full- 
back C; A:, for example, indicates a back- 
up, while Fullback A: C: implies a restore. 
Bigback performs a restore function with a 
switch setting. Other switches allow you to 
back up by date, set the archive bit, leave it 
unchanged, and turn it off. 

The DlRimage program displays your 
directories along with the number of bytes 


■ Because Fullback is 
actually a transfer utility, 
you perform a restore 
by reversing the 
drive letters on the 
command line. 


their files occupy. You simply .select the 
directories you want to back up and have 
DlRimage create them on the target disk. 
While the process is almost immediate and 
extremely easy, the program does not pre- 
vent you from creating more directories 
than a disk can hold once the files are trans- 
ferred into them. 

Despite the simplicity of its commands, 
Alps Software's Fullback package is not 
for you if you have a tendency to suffer 
from DOS-phobia. 

Sav Key 

If Sav Key works as advertised, it has more 
to do with DOS than with Business Pro, 
the creators of this front end to DOS's 
BACKUP, RESTORE, and FORMAT 
programs. Even before installation, the 
program insists you copy the DOS pro- 
grams to the root directory. Then, it need- 
lessly and inconsiderately changes your 
AUTOEXEC.BAT. 

After running the PC Magazine Labs 
tests, I renamed three text files to the ap- 
propriate DOS program names and rein- 
stalled the Sav Key program. It installed 
without a hitch and then crashed when it 


tried to do a full backup. When I called it 
back, its “catalog” showed the backup as 
completed. I tried a daily backup; all the 
appropriate messages appeared, and the 
system froze. When I rebooted, both 


“completed” backups were listed. 

Other than giving you a menu interface 
and a report feature, Sav Key adds very lit- 
tle to IXDS's programs. For example, to 
leam the number of floppy disks you need. 


Org ' makes Organization 
Charts... Quickty 

Announcing Org, to give gou the advantage 
of an up-to-date, professional looking 
Organization Chart .. .no matter how often it changes 


Your organi^tion chart is a powerful tool 
to communicate company structure and 
change. Yet new charts are time con- 
suming to make and revise. Often they 
are out-of-date and poorly drawn. 

Now there’s Org — a program for file 
IBM PC and compatible computers. 

Org dramatically reduces the time it takes 
to create and maintain your organization 
chart. 

Just Enter Names 
Simply type names, titles and comments 
into a display that shows each manager 
and his or her direct subordinates. 

Now Org does the hard work. 

Draws Automatically, 
Professionally 

Org automatically draws and spaces the 
boxes, centers the text and precisely 
lays out the connecting lines. For a chart 
of 25 employees this involves over 23, 000 
separate calculations. (No wonder it t^es 
the entire afternoon to make CHie by hand. ) 
With a typical printer you have your chart 
in about 3 minutes. 

Your printed chart is clean and exact. 


And you can use it in any situation, no 
matter how formal. 

Easily Update Charts 

With several keystrokes you can add, 
delete, or move employees— even en- 
tire departments. 

The revised chart is immediately avail- 
able to explain and communicate the new 
organization. 

C(Mnplex charts can be as wide as nec- 
essary with up to 250 employees and 99 
levels. Staff and dotted-line reporting 
relationships are provided for. 

Try Org Risk Free 

Don’t wait until someone asks you for a 
current organization chart. Order today 
and be ready. The cost is less than doing 
one simple chart by hand. 

30 day money back guarantee if you are 
not satisfied for any reason. 

OS phn $3.00 shipfiing. 72,95 total 
^0^*90 CAresidentsaM$4.S5aalesuu, 

To order, cal! 415-794-6850. 

f%QfUt£A/ 5278 Reeder Court 
P.O.Box 7865 

HUi£/ Fremont, CA 94537 


Org tracks on any (BM PC/XT/AT^ or 100% cucnpatibk computer with 192Kb of RAM. DOS version 2.0orhif^r and 

a printer are required. Org is not copy protected A 60 page User's Guide and telephone stq)pofl are mduded 

IBM iiareSiSleredUMlenurkollMernaiKmal Businesi MachinctCorp' OlMS Banner Blue 


Banner Blue 5278 Reeder Court, P.0, Box 7865. Fremont. CA 94537. Phone (415) 794-6850 ” 

Send me a copy of Org.”* I wantmy CM'ganization chart to be up-to^Jate and professional looking. Org has a 
30 day money back guarantee if I am not satisfied for any reason. 

$69.95 phis $3.00 shippmg. CAresiden(sadd$4.5Ssales tax. Outside H Check □ MasterCa^ n Purch. Order 
Immpayi 


USAadd$10.00and 
Card No. 

Name ... . 

Company 

Shipping Address 
City- 


e payment in US dollars drawn on a US bank. 


□ VISA □ American Express 
Expires - 


Signature _ 


Zip 


CIRCLE 367 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
337 



TECH PC TWIN MULTIUSER 

Starting From $1699 

TECH PC/XT BASE UNIT WITH 640K. AND TWO 360K DISK DRIVES, 

TWO HIGH RESOLUTION MONITORS. TWO SELECTRIC STYLE HI-TEK 
KEYBOARDS, 50 FEETOFSHIELDEDCABLETOSEPARATETHETWO STATIONS. 


SYSTEM SUPPORTS UP TO SIX PRINTERS. 


FULL SOFTWARE SUPPORT WITH MULTI-LEVEL FILE SECURITY, ELECTRONIC 
MESSAGE FACILITY TO SEND AND RECEIVE MESSAGE BETWEEN USERS, 
PASSWORD LOGON SYSTEM, AND SYSTEM 
OPERATOR COMMAND LEVEL. 

SYSTEM SUPPORTS ALL POPULAR 
SOFTWARE SUCH AS WORDSTAR. 

DBASEIII, LOTUS 123, MULTI- 
MATE, ETC 



TECH PC 
TRIAD 
MULTIUSER 
Starting From $2599 



TECH POXT BASE UNIT WFTH 640K AND TWO 360K DISK DRIVES 
SEmRATE INTEL 80188 MICROPROCESSOR RUNNING AT 8 MHZ AND 512K 
FOR EACH TERMINAL 

THREE HIGH RESOLUTION MONITORS, THREE SELECTRIC STYLE HITEK 
KEYBOARDS, 50 FEET OF SHIELDED CABLE TO SEPARATE THE THREE 
STATIONS 

SYSTEM EXPANDABLE TO 32 WORKSTATIONS 
SYSTEM SUPPORTS UP TO SIX PRINTERS 

FULL SUPPORT FOR MULTITASKING MULTITERMINAL USE WITH PRINT 
SPOOUNG FOR MULTIPLE PRINTERS. BACKGROUND MONITORING OFTHE 
SYSTEM DIAL UP BULLETIN BCARD SUPPORT PASSWORD PROIEiCTION, AND 
HLE/REOORD DOCKING SUPPORTING PC NETWORK PROIOCOL 
SYSTEM SUPPORTS ALL POPULAR SOFTWARE SUCH AS WORDSTAR, 
DEASEIII, LOTUS 123, MUUIMATE, ETC 


THE TECH PC 

THE TECH PC MULTIUSER COMPUTER SYSTEMS 
ARE MULTISUER MS/PC-DOS BASED MULTIUSER 
SYSTEMS WITH PERIPHERAL WORKSTATIONS OR 
TERMINALS INTERFACED TO A CENTRAL WORKSTA- 
TION WHICH HAS SYSTEM DATAFILES. PROGRAMS, 
AND SUPPORT PERIPHERALS. THE FOUR DIFFERENT 
MULTISUER SYSTEMS VARY IN THEIR PROCESSING 
POWER, THE NUMBER OF TERMINALS THEY CAN 
SUPPORT, AND THE EASE WITH WHICH THEY CAN 
FULFILL ANY OF A WIDE VARIETY OF MULTIUSER 
APPLICATIONS. THE TECH PC TWIN AND THE TECH 
PC TRIAD MULTIUSER SYSTEMS ARE DESIGNED FOR 
THE SMALL BUSINESS OWNER WITH AN IMME- 
DIATE NEED FOR A SMALL MULTIUSER SYSTEM. 


TeGtsPC 714/754-1170 

2131 South Hathaway Santa Ana, California 92705 
1^16x272006 Answer Back -TECH FAX: 71415568325 


MULTIPLE 

THIRD PARTY 
AVAILABLE THROUGH 


TECH PC QUAD 
MULTIUSER 

Stardng From $4499 


TECH TURBO PC/AT BASE UNIT IN PORTABLE OR DESKTOP 
CONFIGURATION WITH 5I2K, MULTIPLE SERIAL PORTS. 
THREE TECH PC TERMINALS, CONNEaiNG CABLES. AND 
NETWORKING SOFTWARE. 

FOUR USERS EXPANDABLETO NINE USERS OVER DUMBTER- 
MINALSOR PC S WITH TERMINAL EMULATION SOFTWARE. 



CAPACITY FOR UP TO 1 6 PRINTERS AT REMOTE SITES WITH 
UP TO 6 LOCAL PRINTERS ATTACHED TO THE MAIN UNIT. 
EACH USER CAN ACCESS 5 1 2 K OF RAM WITH MEMORY EX- 
PANSION BOARDS. 

FULL SUPPORT FOR MULTITASKING MULTITERMINAL USE 
WITH PRINTSPOOLING FOR CENTRAL OR TERMINAL PRIN- 
TING, BACKGROUND MONITORING OF THE SYSTEM, DIAL 
UP BULLETIN BOARD SUPPORT, PASSWORD PROTECTION. 
AND HLE/RECORD LOCKING USING PC NETWDRK PROIDCOL 
SYSTEM SUPPORTS ALL POPULAR SOFTWARE SUCH AS 
WORDSTAR, DBASEIII. LOTUS 123, MULTIMATE, ETC. 


MULTIUSER SYSTEM 


TECH PC 
TURBO QUAD 
MULTIUSER 

starting From $5999 


THE TECH PC QUAD AND THE TECH PC TURBO 
QUAD SYSTEMS ARE DESIGNED FOR LARGER 
MULTIUSER APPLICATIONS WITH 4 TO 32 WORKSTA- 
TIONS OR TERMINALS ATTACHED TO THE CENTRAL 
WORKSTATION. TECH PC MULTIUSER SYSTEMS CAN 
BE CONFIGURED TO BE AS POWERFUL AS ANY 
MULTIUSER MINICOMPUTER SYSTEM. YET THEY 
WILL STILL RUN YOUR FAVORITE MS/PC DOS 
PACKAGES IN A MULTIUSER ENVIRONMENT. 

CALL OR WRITE TECH PERSONAL COMPUTERS 
FOR MORE INFORMATION ON OUR FULL LINE OF 
DESKTOP. PORTABLE. MULTISUER. AND MINI- 
COMPUTER SYSTEMS AND OUR FULL LINE OF 
COMPUTER SYSTEM ACCESSORIES. 

CHOICE 

MAINTENANCE 
MOHAWK DATA SCIENCES 


TECH PC/XT BASE UNIT IN PORTABLE OR DESKTOPCONFIGURATION 
WITH 640K, MULTIPLE SERIAL PORTS. THREETECH PCTERMINALS. 
CONNECTING CABLES. AND NETWORKING SOFTWARE. 
SEPARATE NEC V20 8088 INTEL COMPATIBLE 8 MHZ CPU AND UP 
TO I MB RAM FOR EACH TERMINAL ON THE SYSTEM. 

TWO FULLY FUNCTIONAL SERIAL PORTS PER TERMINAL. 

FOUR USERS EXPANDABLE TO 32 USERS OVER DUMBTERMINALS 
OR PCS WITH TERMI N AL EMULATION SOFTWARE. CAPACITY FOR 
UNLIMITED NUMBER OF LOCAL PRINTERS. 

FULL SUPPORT FOR MULTITASKING MULTITERMINAL USE WITH 
PRINT SPOOLING FOR MULTIPLE PRINTERS. BACKGROUND 
MONITORING OFTHESYSTEM. DIAL UP BULLETIN BOARD SUPPORT 
PASSWORD PROTECTION. AND FILE/RECORD LOCKING SUPPORTING 
PC NETWORK PROTOCOL. 

SYSTEM SUPPORTS ALL POPULAR SOFTWARE SUCH AS WORDSTAR. 
DBASEIII, LOTUS 123, MULTIMATE, ETC 


QRCLE 504 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


■ BACKUP SOFTWARE 


you must consult the manual. What Sav 
Key does add, however, is more process- 
ing time and dependency on Business 
Pro’s system. To restore any files, you 
must first insert the system disk, then the 


first backup disk, the system disk again, 
and once more the backup. The disk swap- 
ping is necessary because Business e4o 
copies RKTORE.COM off the backup 
disk. 


If none of the above offends you, con- 
sider this: Sav Key's menu includes an 
“End of Day” option consisting of an on- 
screen message that tells you to turn off 
your computer. You can use batch files to 
create a more efficient and friendlier front 
end than the one Business Pro created in 
Sav Key, Version 2. 1 — and you can 
charge $89.95 for it. 

DataCare 

Ellicott Software’s DataCare uses both 
menu and command-line interfaces to give 
you a backup at least as reliable as that of 
DOS — and with better-than-average 
speed. For restoration, DataCare uses 
DOS’s RESTORE and VERIFY pro- 
grams. The menu interface is concise, in- 
tuitive, and a pleasure to use. The com- 
mand-line interface includes six switches 
for including subdirectories, appending 
files to a previously backed-up floppy 
disk, printing the index, backing up by 


W- 

C T F 1 L 

fflii F A 





OatJCare’" 

Verskm 1.4 



Ellicott Software 



3777 Plum HillQ. 



Ellicott City, MD 21043 



(301)465-2690 



List Price: $129 



Requires: I28KRAM, 

DOS 2.0 or later. 



In Short: This reliable, faster-than-average 
backup (Mogram uses both menu and com- 
mand-line interfaces and offers three very 
useful utilities. Not copy protected. 
CIRCLEa470N READER SER^^CATO 


TakeTwo, 

Version 1.04 
United Sofhvare 
Security 

8133 L^burgPike, 
#800 

Vienna, VA 22180 
(800)892-0007 
List Price: S165; copy-protected version, 
$115 

Requires: 128K RAM, hard disk drive, 
floppy disk drive. 

In Sbrnt: The best all-around menu-driven 
backup program reviewed here, TakeTwo of- 
fers informative screens, speed, and a variety 
of options. Optional copy protection. 
CI^LEaOON READER SERVICE CARO 


Accounting For Micros 


$395 


Set of Four 
$32$ Set of Three 
$4$S Set of Five 



Aecoufmm 

integrated account!! 
meet professional 
fast and easy to use, with' 
struclions. Our manual (shown 
also includes helpful mfurmatu< 
bfMkkeeping and computers. 

OENERAL l£DOER $12S 

Allows up to I.OOO accounts & 1.000 
transactionsmonth. Retains miVend 
balances for Last year, This Year and 
Forecast Includes Cash Disburse- 
ments, Cash Receipts and General 
lournab Reports include Balance 
Sheet. Income Statement, Annual 
Summaries and )oumai Reports 

ACCOUHTS RECEmMLE $128 

Allows up to 2,500 customers and 1,000 
invoices per month tnvoicingcanacress 
Inventory .Module. Keeps customer 
names and addres.ses. Invoice prints on 
fJain paper or any pre-pnnted form. 
Statements .can be pnnted at any time 

tNVENTOm ............................ 8128 

Allows up to 4,000 parts. Keeps 3 
month history of unit sates as well as 
year to dale. VMth AR, can be used as 
point of sale system (prints invoices, 
handles cash). Reports indude Inven- 
tory Value and Slock Report. Internal 
and Customer Price List 


Air«i«®ioX_ ... 

Rii^AdsaMrapiHlrid hand- 
written «.n^ii(d.aM||^fTimpiik'r checks 
onanypre-prfllwfiiifm. Keeps vendor 
names and addresses. 

mnoa si2s 

Will handle up to 100 cmpk>yw‘9 with 
eight deductions per empluvee. Deduc- 
tions mav be determined as fUed d>^lar 
amounts or percentages, or referred to 
a table for automatic kiok-up. Tax tables 
are easily entered, or purchased sepa- 
rately, Pnnls checks and W2 s. 

SETOFflVe $4SS 

SET Of FOUR $398 

SET OF THREE S32S 

RVN ON mOST CPM AND MSDOS 

Appie CPU m KKlPC itAT SertfO m 

CMmM Aa«i« (•’t 

Ccapta Uonom itti kirVtiMe 

ftmw 0$tem»u/) ZenmKOiliO 

EaewfM PwutuiK $'CPU 

ep$onQX-ie fimie $ntek CPU OewennpMHti 


Trv til 5 progitms thmt fCL Ait, AE 
Ifi. FRI. Order Pur DFMO DISK for 
iU.OO finriudei $hippingl. Consented 
renhns ol Hie ptogrim$ give teir the 
'fttl' ol d*U tfitry tnd ttct$s, lnelude$ 
umple reports tnd iiulnitlloni. Speeih 
mtehioe. 

TMAN fl2S 

The "Calch-Alf’ program Files anv 
type of infnrmabon for <^uick access 
Name or subject onented with 15 lines 
ol notes per name. Use TMAN as a 
mailing list, filing system, notebook, 
etc Can be used alone or with data 
from nur other progr.un- 
Tt\ TMAN DEMO SB 

WWnXWDflf: Please specify machine 
and disk fumut You can pay by check, 
by VISA or MasterCard (we ne^ your 
rcpiration dale and card numbrrl, or bv 
L PS COD (add 52.50 COD charge). Our 
price includes shipping Minnesota resi- 
dents, add 6% sak^ tax). Vk ship most 
orderj the same da\’, 
or I 


James River Group 


Depl. PC 

125 North First Street 
Minneapolis, MN 55401 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
340 




date and archive bit, and suppressing the 
beep. 

While you can run DalaCare without 
reading the manual, you should read it to 
learn what the three utilities included on 
the disk do. D.COM, which displays an 
enhanced directory listing, has optional 
switches for seeing hidden and system 
files, the file’s attributes, the number of 
floppy disks needed for backup, and totals 
for listed files, content bytes, and allocated 
space. CMP.COM compares two files 
anywhere on the disk. R.COM renames 
files and resets the archive bit so that the 
files will be backed up on the next opera- 
tion, renames subdirectories, and moves 

■ While you can run 
DataCare without reading 
the manual, you should 
read it to learn what 
the three utilities included 
on the disk do, 

flies and entire subtrees. 

If you have been using DOS’s BACK- 
UP and RESTORE and would like some 
added features and speed during the back- 
up process, DalaCare is well worth the in- 
vestment. If you don’t already have a pro- 
gram that renames directories and 
performs moves, DataCare would be an 
invaluable addition to your software li- 
brary. 

TakeTwo 

After receiving one too many customer 
complaints about incompatibilities and 
scrubbed installs. United ^ftware Securi- 
ty (USS) removed the copy protection 
from TakeTwo. I’m very pleased, not only 
with this recent him of events but also with 
the backup program itself An extremely 
easy-to-use program, TakeTwo includes 
informative screens and reports and offers 
a variety of backup options. (If you belong 
to the Don’t-You-Daie-Use-My-Program- 
on-Another-Machine school, you can still 


P C 






iFYDURtINTHE 
VALUE' ADDING 
BUSINESS 
«*2‘&60Eklfc 
ADDSALUTMOeE 
TOVOUR GBAPMIC5 APPUCAHON 
tMANVDUU BIER GET R?OM 
STANDARD EGA PERFORMANCE. 



WANTTOCMNiiGE A FEN PUaS 
INYOUR IMAGE? 
BOB/ifcRUNSUPTCM 

T^MVCSToeofE/lE'S 
IG-BIT 





eoe/ifc 16 foTALLy 

CGACOMRWIBIE.IGO — SO 
YOUCANRONWyoFINOSE 

'(rt)U5AN0& OF CSA 
^GRAWltSPACKADESON 
1HE MARKET. INCKOieLe 
AS IT fW SEEM. IBM'S EGA 
ANDTvIEClOMESCAN^r. 

%-cM 

AS*2U)Efife NEVER CONTENT 
ToejAHDOMtt'TSlRKC^; 


PERSYST 



EMULEX PERSYST 

For further information, caU I-SiHFEMlJLEXS, or write Persyst Division, 
Emulex Corp., 3S4S Harbor Blvd, P.O. Box 6725, Costa Mesa, CA 92626. 

Persyst and BoB arc registered trademarks of Emulex Corporation. 

IBM and A.T are registered trademarks of International Business Marines Corporatkm. 


MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
341 








New from Peter Norton. 

THE QUICK AND EASY HARD DISK MANAGER. 
LETS YOU TAKE CHARGE OF YOUR COMPUTER. 


Point 

Shoot 



Command 



INORTON 

TOMMANDER 

i^WWWWr 


Rip full throttle through your 
data with this time-saving con- 
trol program from Peter Norton. 
The Norton Commander" soft- 
ware gives you a fast, powerful 
point and shoot method to per- 
form your computer operations. 
Point to a directory and The 
Commander jumps to it Point 
to your 
data file 
and The 


Commander runs your data 
with its matching program. 
Speed through listings, update 
files like lightning. Delete. Copy. 
Built-in sweep functions manage 
your disk. Add your own user 
menus for one-key operation. 
And it doesn ’t eat up your screen 
while it’s doing it. Easy to use 
with keyboard or mouse. The 
Norton Commander. The quick- 
est way to enhance your PC, and 
take command. 


The Norton Commander. Designed for the IBM* PC 
PC‘AT. and DOS compatibles. At your software dealer 
or order direct for $75 from Peter Nortt>n Computing, 
Inc., 2210 Wilshire Boulevard, Santa Monica, CA 90403. 
213>453-2361.Visa and Mastercard welcome. 


• liilmirtiatIWw Ni 


CMVim*. Inc CI9 MMhNi 


■ BACKUP SOFTWARE 


buy a copy-protected version.) 

The first thing you notice when using 
the program to back up your data is 
TakeTwo's screen. It lists the number of 
files, number of bytes, and number of flop- 
pies — indicating not only what must be 
backed up, but also the progress and the 
percentage completed. Also displayed are 
the volume name and the rate (in kilobytes) 
at which it is transferring data. The restore 
screen is similar. Such information may 
not be necessary, but it is reassuring. 

When backing up, TakeTwo writes a 
volume label on the target, codes the direc- 
tory names with the date of the backup, 
and sets the DOS-compatible files as read- 
only. When restoring files, it prompts you 


■ Easy-to-use 
includes informative 
screens and reports and 
offers a variety of backup 
options. 


for the destination and the filename. This 
prompt gives you a chance to restore the 
file either to a different drive or directoiy 
or to the original one but with a different 
name. Because TakeTwo does not back up 
DOS's hidden system files, you cannot 
mistakenly overwrite the ones on the disk 
and thereby create a nonbootable hard 
disk. 

The catalog on the hard disk is the basis 
for TakeTwo's history report. The report, 
which is as extensive as the backup and re- 
store display screens, tells you virtually 
everything you’d like to know. 

TakeTwo seems to take an inordinate 
amount of time to back up small files. It 
spends most of the time writing catalogs 
and indexes to both the floppy and the hard 
disk. When it came to the 10-megabyte 
test file, though, only Fastback and the 
command-line-driven transfer programs 
were quicker. 

According to a USS company spokes- 
woman, future enhancements for Take- 
Two include support for color and other 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
342 


Evm Bumtss mm ah ibm-pc 

WHO wms TO PAY IBM 
WE HAYE A SOIOTION!!! 


A 100% Compatible PC-XT 
BASE PRICE $950.00 LEASE $39/M0 
With 20 MEG Hard Disk $1399.00 LEASE $56/M0 


Our PC-XT TURBO COMPUTER runsall the popular Business Pro- 
grams, like Lotus 1, 2, 3, Word Pertect, Wordstar, dBase III, 
Momebase, Sidekick, and Flight Simulator. In addition to running 
the progams at the standard I BM clock speed of 4 .77 Mhz, it also 
runs at 8 Mhz — almost twice as last as IBM. 


HERE’S WHAT YOU GET 

ACS-Turbo Mother Board 4.77/8.0 Mhz 
640K of RAM 
Two 360K Floppy Drives 
Heavy Duty 135 Watt Power Supply 
Keyboard New "AT” Type with Large Enter Key 
Parallel Printer Port 
Monochrome Graphics Display Card 
High Resolution Mono Monitor 
with Swivel Base and Anti-Glare Screen 


OPTIONS 

20 MEG Hard Disk $449.00 

20 MEG Tape Back-Up $495.00 

Clock/Calendar $59.00 

Internal Modem 300/1200 BAUD $199.00 

Okidata 192 Printer $399.00 


PROGRAMS INCLUOED 

Included in the purchase price Is PC-DOS, the standard IBM 
operating system. With our Hard Disk Computer, you also get 
HOMEBASE, a general purpose multi-function program to perform 
word processing, electronic filing, and data base management. 
HOMEBASE has a built-in calendar, with monthly, weekly, and 
daily scheduling. The Homebase Calculator lets you perform 
calculations on the monitor and the ability to print a paper tape 
if desired. HOMEBASE also includes a communication program 
with autodialer for communication with other computers (requires 
a modem). 


5 YEAH WARRANTY AVAILABLE 

GUARANTEE & WARRANTY 

We guarantee you will be delighted with our ACS-T urbo Computer 
or we will refund your purchase price. We warranty our Turbo 
Computer 1 00% Parts & Labor for 1 year. We believe our computer 
is even more reliable than I BM — that 's why we' re offering a five- 
year extended warranty for only $30.00 a year. 

HOW TO ORDER 

Call us at (818) 889-1092. We have experienced salespeople to 
advise you with your computer requirements. 

You can charge our ACS-Turbo Computer with a VISA or Master- 
Card. We also have a lease plan available for qualified businesses, 
with payments from 36 monfhs to 60 months, 

*IBM is a registered trademark of International Business Machines. 



Avenue, Suite A, Agoura Hills, CA 91301 
Phone: 818/889-1092 Fax: 818/889-5605 Telex: 299 353 POST UR 
EASY LINK Mailbox: 62941735 Telex: 5106018224 ACS AGRA HILLS UQ 


CIRCLE 101 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



ORDER TOLL FREE 
24 HOURS EVERY DAY 
800-662-2686 

HARDWARE 

COMPUTERS 

IBM COMPATIBLES 640K Rom KevOoora 1 yr wor 
w/1 floppy 599 Plus 20MB Hord Disk 1079 


PANASONIC BUSINESS PARTNER CALL 

E«CUT(VE PARTNER CALL 


ATARI ST COMPUTERS / IH COMPUTERS CALL 
MODEMS. BOARDS. DRIVES 


E«n»m 1200 mtamoi 175 

HoynUoMms CALL 

RoctfVodK 1200 239 

PnxncolMo(Mm1200 135 

GVIOO Spectrum 279 

QuodEGA-f 399 

SVTUCoior350 369 

SrgmoColorAOO 469 

Uorx) GrapMcs Cord 99 

VkHoTVego 399 

ASTRompogt 245 

Aomp^ AT 449 

AST Adwioge 359 


SaPaAPius364K 219 

miel Above Board 269 

AboveBoord PS 309 

Above Board AT 419 

>Rom2/3 135/179 

>9om3AT 239 

>Lasarl 199 

Tecmot Coplain 364K 199 

6 function Cord 3e4K 169 

20MB Hord Oisk Kit 429 

F4S Cord 20M8 659 

iameoa210H 1995 

Daiosn«td XT300 369 


PRINTERS, PLOHERS 4 MONITORS 


EPSON'AII Models CAU Amdek310A 149 

Canon Loser Prviler 2099 Amdeii 600/722 419/519 

Cil2en1200 199 NEC 12B0 TTL Mono 119 

Cnw Prsmiare 35 509 NEC 1401 Multi- 9^ 559 

Panasonic 1091 249 SonyKVISII R68/TV 4^ 

1092/1592 319/449 Tann620 399 

RoKndDXV-IOI Ptotier 509 Taan630/64O 456/519 

HouWon Wet D»itf^29 1650 Thompson 36432 319 


-SOFTWARE - 


—ACCOUNTING — 
BR Aocnmo^Mod 
BPi Enisrpnse/Mod 
PiocMree/ Module 
Bock To Bosics Acc»o 
Open SyMms/Moduie 
Aragon 
S8T Al Modules 


lrom3l9 dBosellPKs 
429 NuisneU 
2^ Porodox 
209 Reflex 
369 RaMnon 
569 PfS fee & Report 
CAa Q&A 


205 


SPREADSHEETS & INTEGRATED SOFTWARE 

Lolus/Symptiony CALL Atxkty 63 

Framework I 369 MuRipian20 <19 

SupercQlc3 209 MosocTwin 89 


- WORD PROCESSING > 


vosnwiterS 
Microson Word 3 
Word Perfect 4 I 


155 PFSWnle& Proof 


219 Mutimate Mvonioge 


- GRAPHICS - 


Cnomosier 
OickArtPeik Pub 
Energraprtcs?0 
Fnsekmce 

Horvord Pies Grapmcs 


219 GenencCdd 
109 ln*A*Vis>on 
309 Mcroso(rCnart2 
209 ProOesigni 
229 Or Hoioliw/Mousa 


- UTILITIES & LANGUAGES - 


Turbo Ligrening 
McrosofrC Compiler 
MtcrosoR Fortran 
Mocro Assembler 
OuchBostc 
Fontnx 
Fostbock 


57 SKtewoys 
239 Trovelrig Sidekicfc 
205 Wndovvs 
90 Pop-Up Oesksei 
63 D«(^iew 
92 Protey 
99 Xiree 


Call Toll Free 24 hrs Every Day 

800-662-2686 orders only 

for Ca Orders, Tech Support. Price Quotes, info 

415-668*9350 9-5 pacific time, rrvf 

Coll or Write for Free Catalog 


PAYMENT: (No P«« For Credtt Cards) Vita MostetCord. 
Coihior’s Checks Pertortol Checks wdh 2 week hold 
Quoiitled PO't CoNlomla resldentt odd sales fox 
SHIPPING: UPS grourvd-2% per order, SS rtwv FREE tor SW 
orders ovrer $1000 UPS Biue-3% per order. $7 mm FREE for 
SW orders over $1500 Printers Momtors Disk Drives 
Computers — CoH for charges 
Atl Products New with lull vrariantles 
Price ft ovoilobuilv tuDiect to chorvge without nohee 



CA 94114 

Computer ft Software secoiists tnce toei 


THE 

BEST 

PRICES 


THE 

BEST 

SERVICE 


■ BACKUP SOFTWARE 


target media such as tape subsystems. 

If you need a history of backups and re- 
stores, prefer or need menus, still want 
control over your files, and aren’t willing 
to give up speed for all that power, get 
USS’s TakeTwo. Then just put up your 
feet, take a 2-minute break, and let Take- 
Two do the rest. 

BackTrack 

Tallgrass Software Technologies’ Back- 
Track is unique in that you can set it to op- 
erate in the background. You must, how- 
ever, keep the BackTrack disk in your 
floppy disk drive. If you have only one 
floppy disk drive, the processing can be- 
come annoying, especially when you need 
the drive for an application. You must first 
suspend BackTrack. swap floppies, use 
the other application, reswap floppies, and 
then resume BackTrack. 

On dual-floppy systems, though, Back- 
Track works like a charm. While access- 
ing the target drive, it puts a smiling face in 
the upper-right-hand comer of the screen. 

BackTrack alters your AUTOEXEC 
. BAT by appending commands at both the 
beginning and the end. It doesn't change 
your CONFIG.SYS, but it does reset the 
buffers at 88 while operating at high speed. 

The program allows different configu- 
rations and times for backup operations. 
You can back up to one of Tallgrass’s tape 
units or a mainframe virtual disk. In addi- 
tion to inclusion and exclusion of files. 


MFACT FILE 


1 BackTrack, 

Version 1.75 

f TaJlgrass Software Tech- 
nologies 

IIIOOW. 82nd St. 
Overland Park, KS 
66214 

! (401)274-0393 

Ust Price: S129 

Requires: 256K RAM, hard disk drive, 
floppy or additional hard disk drive- 
in Short: BackTrack processes in the back- 
ground and allows difterent configuratioas 
and times for backup operations, but it tends 
to be space hungry. Copy protected for all 
versions made prior to July I . 

C1RCLE6460N READER SEF1V1CE CARD 


BackTrack can back up or restore when 
given a range of dates. 

BackTrack can restore floppy disks out 
of sequence. While this capability may be 
a boon in certain circumstances, it defmite- 
ly causes problems with split files. 

Tallgrass has promised to eliminate its 
copy protection scheme as of July 1 (cur- 
rently a backup disk is sent to you when 
you register). But BackTrack has two other 
problems with its installation. If your hard 
disk is nearly full, BackTrack installs par- 
tially and then crashes when run. (This 
limitation prevented us from mnning the 
PC Magazine Labs 10-megabyte test; we 
substituted a 5-megabyte test file.) Also, if 
you do not insert the second disk when 
asked, the installation's verify module 
cannot find the files, assumes they were 
not copied because of insufficient space, 
prints a warning, and exits. 

Although it can sometimes be annoy- 
ing, BackTrack can handle all your backup 
work — as long as you have the room to 
spare on your hard disk. 

Fastback 

Running Fifth Generation Systems’ Fast- 
back must be a lot like being a jockey on 
the lead horse in the Derby. You may not 
hear the roar of the crowd, but you can al- 
most feel the wind as your arms swing 
from side to side slapping one floppy disk 
after another into the drive. Fastback is the 
program the rest are mnning after. And to a 
point, you cannot blame them. A 10-min- 
ute backup is enough to make anyone think 
of thoroughbreds. Unfortunately, Fast- 
back is also as temperamental as a thor- 
oughbred. (For example. Fastback backs 
up to floppies only — and it has compatibil- 
ity problems with many of the mail-order 
IBM clones.) 

Before it completes its installation, 
Fastback. which requires a key disk for 
operation, needs to check and pass your 
drives — drives are rejected on the basis of 
rotational speed — and the DMA chip on 
the controller. If you have a defective chip, 
Fastback sets itself at a slower speed (a re- 
placement chip is available from Fifth 
Generation at a nominal cost). If your 
DMA chip passes, that's still no guarantee 
that it won’t fail at some future time (as 
mine did). If, on the other hand. Fast- 
back's installation procedure flunks your 


CIRCLE 527 ON READER SERVICE CARD PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 

.144 




FACT 


FILE 



Fastback, 

Version 5.03 
Fifth Generation 
Systems 

7942 Picardy Ave.. 
B-350 

Baton Rouge. LA 70809 
(800) 21S-2775 


(213)493-4483 
LisI Price: S!79 

Requires: I28K RAM. hard disk dnve. 
(loppy disk drive. 

In Short: Fa.st but temperamental. Fastback 
offers batch file support with sonK handy op- 
tions. but it backs up to floppies onlv and 
plays a pass/fail game with hardware Copy 
protected. 

CIRCLE 644 ON READER SERViCt. CAFIO 


chip, the problem may really lie in the 
drive Fastback passed, since the program 
uses the drive to test the chip. 

Some of Fastback’% spe^ comes from 
running the drives constantly. You insert 
and remove floppies while the drive is still 
spinning and the red light is on. Fastback 
checks the drive door to find out when 
you’ve inserted a floppy disk. This elimi- 
nates the time needed for the drive to rev 
up to speed with each disk swap. 

The backup and restore menus are es- 
sentially the same, the main difference be- 
ing the options available. Batch file sup- 
port includes three options: include 
subdirectories, include modified files 
only, and verify after write. If Fastback 
finds an error while the verify switch is 
set — and it usually does — it kills the entire 
backup or restore. 

If you are averse to key disks. Fifth 
Generation will supply a two-time in- 
stall/uninstall version of Fastback for an 
additional $25. All in all. I'd rather use a 
slower program that lets me back up to any 
device, doesn't play pass/fail with my 
hardware (which other programs find ac- 
ceptable), and produces a backup that oth- 
er programs can manipulate. 

Bakup 

No one can say that the developers at Soft- 
ware Integration didn’t try to make Bakup 
a friendly program. Bakup offers both a 
menu and a command-line interface, sup- 



SPEED 

LIMIT 


Introducing the 


MICROSYNC 
JUST BROKE THE PC 


Sometimes your 
computer seems to crawl 
through applications, it slows down, 
drags its feet and makes you want to 
scream. Don't scream. . .get The SCREAMER, 
the newest timesaver from Microsync 
The SCREAMER breaks old PC speed limits by doubling the 
speed of your IBM" PC, XT or compatible*, which means you get 
faster word processing, speedier spread sheets, double-time data bases 
and much more. All aspects of your PC operations are speeded-up. 
including I/O, memory access and disk access. 

The SCREAMER has an on-board battery backed-up clock-calendar, 
keyboard selectable speed control, fits in a short expansion slot, and is 
compatible with all your hardware and software. 

Break the ^eed limit on your PC. and write your own ticket on 
performance. Order a SCREAMER today. 

AT™ version available late summer. 


RO. BOX 116302 • Carrollton. Texas 75011 • (214) 492-5265 

*Actuat speed dependent on system cnnfiguraiion and software application 
Microsync ar>d Screamer are trademarks of Microsync. Inc. 

IBM IS a registered trademark of International Business Machines 
AT IS a trademark of Inlerrtational Business Machines. 


CIRCLE 395 ON READER SERVICE CARD 






Nh^ department 


They said that putting data processing in 
control of PC software was too much trouble. 


took aH die 


ipyings 

were sued, guess where the fingers pointed. 


Software piracy is a Federal aime. At ADAPSO, the computer software 
and services industry association, we’re working to help data processing 
managers like you prevent the problem. And to help your compeiny 
avoid substantial fines and legal fees. 

Vbu can help top management protect your company by aaively 
discouraging software piracy ADAPSO can provide you with sample 
policy statements and free booklets for company employees. 

Just return the coupon. It could put you back in control. And it might 
keep your department off the hook. 


business card for more information. 


Send this coupon or your business card for mo 
Or call us at (/03) 52z-5065 and ask for Muriel. 
ADAPSO, 1300 North Seventeenth Street, Arlington, 
Virginia 22209 



Software Piracy is a Federal Crime 






REPRiNrcOFnOM 



~KA-Ur 




IBEi# SEPTEMBER 10. 1985 

i=^=^=^= IIL2n.ll 


THE NATIONAL NEWSPAPER OF IBM STANOARD MICROCOMPUTING 


TathMindet* Tool Handy 
for Making Haid Disks Easier 



O ur penchaiK for categoriiinf things, 
from music to politicura to social po- 
sitions, carries over into our percep- 
tion of software. 

Thai's one of the reasons software pub- 
lisben bemoan what they like to call “the 
bottleneck at retair.- It's lough to get a new 
program in an est^tshed category onto 
the market; nearly impossible to get a new 
kind of program on the shelves. 

Because sheep-like, we follow the same 
ruts across the pasture to the old, familiar 
stuff. 

That preference for sorting inograms out 
into loo few and usually ill-dnirt^ catego- 
ries has meant we've seen a slew of often 
very diflerenl utilities lumped together into 
the “disk manager" and “DOS command 
sbeir slots. 

The market’s perception (or mispercep- 
tion) of a pre^ram's natural habitat leads to 
confusion for buyers, and also means a few 
exceptional programs get buried under 
lesser but market-leading competitors to 


Jim Seymour wn'res the sytidkated news- 
paper eWantn, ’’MkroBuiiness. '* and helps 
corporate clients keep their mkrocompuier 
ft^ppy 


whom they're only distantly related. 

iWlucr 

htthhilnder, from Westlake Data, is a 
perfect example of such a winner — a power 
tool far belter than anything like it on the 
market, but one which suffered from being 
second (or maybe fifth or eighth) of its kind 
to market. On the surface it looks like a 
DOS command shell; in practice, it's a so- 
phisticated disk manager, a nearly indis- 
pensable tool for hard-disk users. 

Bourbaki's /dir was the first “disk man- 
ager" utiUiy I saw. and it was and remains a 
good product. But /d/r suffers from a prob- 
im I find almost universal among com- 
mand shells: After a while, you begin find it 
tiring, and eventually find you don't use it 
much any more. 

By contrast, FathMinder is so fast, con- 
venient and useful that I use it constantly, 
and can no longer iln^ine trying to run a 
large-capacity hard di^ without it. The 
program uses windows for liMs of directo- 
ries. subdirectories and files, and lets you 
move thinp among them quickly with a 
Ltrius-like menu across the top of the 
screen. You can execute almost anything 
possible within the DOS command-set (ex- 
cept a single-st«, copy-and-rename opera- 
tion) by simply hitting the first letter o ( the 
English-language term for what you want 
to do. 

Because it’s memory-resident, Path- 
Minder runs lightning fast; because it fol- 
lows the DOS rules, it runs with almost 
anything you can mi on a disk. 

“• . iiilffl llliill llliilii mil 1^^ 
good Kreen-orienied editor lei^y^l^ 
,dcan up BATs and add new flourishes 


to your AUTOEXEC and COrinc files 
without having to bool up your igvonie 
plain-ASCll word processor or 
CONning. 

The .BAT-ftle copying and .BAT- 
erasing capabilities of PathMindtr are 
alone worth the price. You can erase 
groups of files, or move groups of files from 
any directory, on any disk, to any other — 
without playitv Wildcard Roulette. 

An encr^^Nioa routine scrambles data 
very nicely. An a^icalions-mcnu genera- 
tor lets you hide FathMinder from the cas- 
ual user, while delivering its power to 
his screen. A user log tracks who used 
the computer for what, how long and for 
whom. 

I don't know DOS like the guys at Mi- 
crosoft. but 1 don't have any trouble re- 
membering bow to CD, MD, DIR, TYPE 
and ASSIuN my way Ihrou^ sessions at 
the computer. But with rare exceptions, I 
still let nthMinder handle the dirty detailv 
of command syntax. And for thooeesee^ 
lions, I use nthMinder'% a^-tfmdow- 
inlo-DOS facility to 
zarre maneuvers. 

Nothing's 
only costv'' 
now down' 
recompilation, 
say — that, fro 
use a dcsk-acctasorks , 
routinely load a macro progt 
won’t give up the memory. 

You don't iKed a disk manager ti^ 
vive close encounters of the hard-disk h 
But if you've never seen PathMmder, you 
^e it to yourself to take a look at the suie 

the art in Making Life Easier. I 



my more bi- 




Coorngrx' <SeSZ<’0*«(PueMnngCofnMnf M IVgnw **" »* ' “ 


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See your Favorite Dealer or 

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OR SEND S39.9S plus SS handling to WESTLAKE DA TA 

Got the name? It’s PathMinder™— Don't boot up without it. 

® WESTLAKE DATA 




P.O. BOX 1711 


AUSTIN, TEXAS 78767 


(512) 474-4666 


CIRCLE 157 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




■ BACKUP SOFTWARE 



ATtT 6300 256K. 2 Or. Mono SCALL 

640K. 10 MB. Mono SCALL 

NEW! SHARP 7000 Portable SCALL 

CORONA 

PC-400-25E.2(lr.512K. 
monitor S1249 

PPC-400-25E 2dr 512K S1249 

NEWt SPERRY m Basic. S12K S2059 

Enhanced 1 M 6 . 44MBHD S3149 



PC256K. 20f 

$1349 

PC256K. 10R.20MB 

$1719 

PC256K. IDr. tOMB 


tOMBTaoe 

$2198 

PC256K. IDr. 20 MB. 


lOMBTaoe 

$2238 

XT640K. 1 DR. 30M8. 


60MB Tape. 

$3399 

AT5t2K.1Dr.20MB. 


eOMBTape. 

$4399 

AT512K.10r.60MB. 


60 MB Tape 

$5220 

rrrxTRA 


XTRA-XP III S12K. 20MB 

$2114 

XTRA-2256K. 2Dr 

$969 

XTRA-3256K.20MB 

$1329 

XTRA-XL 

SCALL 

NCR 


PC 6 w 20MB 

$1749 

PC 8 Enhanced. 20MB 

$3399 

NECAPCIII 


Hl02MMono2Dr 

$1182 

H12tC20MB. Color 

S1899 

H121CW AUTOCAD 

$3699 

NECAPCrV 


H400 I 2MBdr (ATCompat] $2679 

PANASONIC 


Sr Partner 256K. 20f 

$1199 

Sr Partner 25FK. lOMB 

$1329 

Exec Partner, 256K2Dr 

$1649 

Bust Partner FX 200 20r 

$1099 

WANG 


PC-PK5 2 Dr . IBM Emulation $21 00 

PC-PK6 1 Or. 10 MB. IBM Emul$3200 

VVOA40S12K.WPM01S 

$2100 

APC80286.512K. 1 2M6clr $2300 

ZENITH 


2F-148-42 

$1050 

ZF-17M2 Portable 

$1679 

ZF-1 58-52 2Df 

$1439 

PRINTERS 


JUKI 5510 Color 

$439 

BROTHER Twinnter 

$899 

HR-15XL M1509 2024LQ $360 389 699 

EPSON 


FX-65 $359 FX-286 

$520 

LQ-800 $485 LQ-1000 

$635 

LX-80 $225 RX-100 

$279 

FUJITSU DP2100 DP22(K1 

$365 450 

CANON Laser Printer 

$1999 

NEC 


ELF-350 $379 P5 P5XL 

$9501119 

NEC 3550 S7S9 P 6 P7 

$449 589 

OKIOATA 


ML-192 S339 ML-193 

$489 

ML-292 S429 ML-293 

$579 

PANASONIC 


KX P1091 $245 KX-P3131 

$189 

KX-P1060 $199 KX-P1592 

$460 

SILVEREEDEXP500 800 

$219 699 

TOSHIBA 


321 341 351 

SCALL 


Genlech 


HARD DISKS & TAPE BACKUP 


INTERNAL HARD DISK KITS 
FOR PC/XT 

PRIAM 40 60MB SCALL 

SEA 6 ATE. TANDON 

10 20 30MB $389 459 769 

INTERNAL HARD DISK KITS 
FOR IBM AT 

PRIAM (30 mil) 

5172MB $999 1299 

SEAGATE 30MB (40mil) S699 

MOUNTAIN HARO CARD 20 MB $879 

PLUS Hard Card 10 20MB $535 689 

CORVUS All models SCall 

IOMEGA Bernoulli dual lOmb $2299 

IRWIN Tape Backup Systems 

Internal 10M6 2(iMB $459 575 

External 10MB 20MB $599 740 

TALL6RASSTG5025 SCALL 

EVEREX 60MB Tape backup $899 

ARCHIVE 60MB EXT TAPE $799 


PLOTTERS t DIGITIZERS 


CALC0MP1043GT $7929 

HOUSTON INSTRUMENTS 
TGI011 $619 OMP-4142 $2499 

0MPS1 52$3759 DMP-51MP $4965 

OMP-29 $1750 DMP-56 $4495 



ROUMD 


OXY-101 $420 OXY-BOO 

$635 

DXY-880 $914 OXy-980 

$1196 

GTCOAII Models 

SCall 

HITACHI Tiger Tablet M 

$619 

SUMMAGRAPHICS Summaskeicb $399 

SUMMAGRAPHICS 1812 

$699 

lOUNElAtoFsizel 

$3995 



MONITORS & TERMINALS 

1 TORCH HL Green Amber 

$99 

AMOEK 


Video300 300A310A $125 130 165 

Color 600 722 

$429 529 

MITSUBISHI All Models 

SCall 

PRINCETON GRAPHICS MAX-12E $175 

HX-12/HX-12E/Sr-12 $469 509 599 

NEC 


MULTISYNC Color Monitor 

$589 

POWERGRAPHICS Monitor 

$1099 

Advanced Color Monrtor 

$569 

ROLAND 


MB-121G/A $109 MB-142 

$269 

QUME101G . 

$329 

SONY KV-1311CR 

$469 

TAXAN630 640 

$455 525 

WYSE 


1 WY-SOWY-SOWY-.’S $319439599 

COMMUNICATIONS & NETWORK 

HAYES 


Smartmodem 1200 2400 

$369 599 

1200 BwSmaitcomll 

$350 

NOVATION Smartcat Plus Ext 

$319 

PRENTICE POPCOM CtOO/XtOO 

$219229 

PROMETHEUS Promodem 1200 

$315 

NOVELL Networking 

SCall 

OCAIRMA'Fastlmk 

SCALL 

ORCHID PC NETWORK 

$795 

SOFTWARE ■■■ 


ASHTON-TATEObaselll 4 ^ 

$419 

Framework II 

$419 

COPYIIPC 

$29 

MICROPRO Wordstar Propak 

$239 

Wordstar 2000 

$259 

MULTIMATE 

$229 

SSI WordPerfect v 4 1 . 

$225 

PfS: Write File Plan Graph 

$85 


GENTECH STANDARD 


GEN TECH AT 


IBM AT COMPATI- 
BLE 8MHZ.11 2MB DR. 

KEYBO I PAR/ 1 SER. 640K 
UPT01M80N60 $1695 


GEN TECH PC $695 


IBM compatible 8D88 
system unit 640K. 360KB 
drive, Keyboard 


HARDWARE 


AST Six Pack Plus 64K 
Advantage 
RAM page 
EVEREX Edge 
HERCULES Graphics Card 
Color Card 


$159 

$369 

$299 

SCALL 

$299 

$155 



INTEL Above Board PC PS SCALL 

PARADISE 5-PAK S125 

QRCHI0PC-TURB0 186 256K $409 


CONQUEST . S279 

QUAORAM 

Expanded Ouadboard 64K S195 

Microta 2 erParrParl 6 K . . $139 

MicrolazerS/S.S'P.P'SSK $139 

QUAOE 6 A enhanced color $399 

EP1CE6Aw64k $299 

SIGMA0ESI6NS $429 

TECMAR Graphics Master $499 

TALL TREE J-RAM3 PC $179 

J-RAM3AT $229 


MEMORY UPGRADES 1-9 10^ 


64K5et 

CALL 

CALL 

128KSeI 

$63 00 

$49 00 

256KSei 

$35 00 

$30 00 

8087-3 

$119 

$109 

8087-2 

$159 

$149 

60287 

$189 

$179 


ACCESSORIES 


SURGE PROTECTORS 


CURTIS Diamond Emerald $33/45 

NETWORK WiretreerPlus $39/55 

KENSINGTON Masterpiece $95 

COMPUTER ACCESSORIES SCall 

DATASHIELOS-85S-1O0 $59 69 

EMERGENCY POWER SYSTEMS 


OATASHIELO PC-200 $315 

SOLA Mini SPS 400 S599 

TRIPPELinBC-425-FC $399 

OATASPEC Switchbox 2 way $49 


DISKETTES 3.S OSOO s.zs osoo 


3M 

$30 60 

$19 00 

MAXEU 

29 00 

21 00 

FUJI 


17 50 

SONY 

36 00 

1700 

GOLDSTAR 


1390 

TDK 

27 00 

16 00 


CUSTOMER SERVICE 


1401-781-0020 


ORDERS ONLY 


8G0-343-4302 

217 Bro „ Suite SIS. NY. NY 10007 
Hours 9-v F.GT tonday-Saturday 
VISA. MASTERCARD. AMEX Accepted 

All returned non-defective merchandise 
are subiect ot a 20 % restocking charge 
Gentech reserves the right to change 
advertised prices 


ports batch files, and creates extremely 
useful backup and restore reports. Among 
its other features. Bakup estimates the 
number of floppy disks and the time need- 
ed to process a backup, and it displays the 
current progress. Bakup sets the read-only 
attribute on backed-up files to prevent ac- 
cidental erasure. The program is even 
packaged with numbered labels for your 
floppy disks. 

While Bakup' i operations are extreme- 
ly easy and reliable (its speed, though it is 
not blinding, is certainly respectable), it 
has a number of minor drawbacks. First 
the program uses an install/uninstall copy- 
protection scheme. Also, it labels the di- 
rectories it creates as BKP(X)010.002, fails 
lo tell you which out-of-sequence floppy 
disk you may have just put in the drive, 
and allows an ill-aimed keystroke to 
change the destination disk during a re- 
store process after you saved the proper 
configuration. On top of that, Bakup' i cat- 
alogs are hidden files; you may begin to 
wonder exactly what Software Integration 
is protecting. 

I like Bakup. I don't like the copy pro- 
tection, the hidden files, and the cryptic di- 
rectory names. 


EDITOR’S 
DBQ CHOICE 


If you don't want to be bothered 
learning commands or remember- 
ing when to perform a backup. 
United Software Security’s 
TakeTwo should be your choice. Its 
automatic and user-scheduled back- 
ups, irformative screens, and re- 
port features make it easy to learn 
and convenient to operate. If you 
are averse to menus and would like 
more control over your options and 
target media, TallTree’ s Jet flies 
like no other. Besides, you also get 
the Jetdrive RAMdisk for the same 
price. If you would like the best of 
both worlds, menus and command- 
lineprocessing, Ellicott Software's 
DataCare does the job. It may use 
DOS' sRESTORE.COM, but it also 
replaces DOS's DIR, REN, and 
COMP commands. 


CtRCLE 266 ON READER SERVICE CARD 















AMERICAS NEXT 

FA/ORITF MOim 


The best 
price: *99 

THE BEST HARDWARE: 

I PC/XT/ AT compatible through your 
serial port 

■ NO pad. NO power supply 

■ High (200 DPI) resolution 

■ Tactile feedback switches 


THE BEST 
SOFTWARE: 

LOGIMOUSEwith 
Plus Package Software 

J119 



NEW Reflex 
& LOGICADD 
Packages! 


LOGIMOUSE'C? 


LOGIPAINT SET-LOGIMOGSE 
with Plus Pkg. coco- 

& PC Paintbru^ 3.0 JUzfO JPlO-/ 
LOGIMOUSE plus PC Paintbrush 3.0 is the most 
advanced paint set available for the PC. Use 
it for designing a logo 
or painting a picture. You 
won't believe its power 
with either freehand 
drawing or graphics! 


■ Driver 3.0: makes LOGIMOUSE run with all mouse based 
software. including Microsoft. 

■ LCXjIMENU: a programmable Pop*Up Menu System that 
customizes LCXjIMOUSE for each of your keyboard based 
applications. 

■ CLICK: a new concept in mouse software! It resides in memory, 
detects what application you're running and automatically 
sets the mouse to your predefined setting. 

■ POINT-AND-CLICK SHELL for Lotus 1-2-3: the only mouse 
interface for 1-2-3 that goes beyond keyboard emulation. With 
context sensitive pop-up menus and an independent mouse 
cursor that changes shape and meaning in different areas of the 
1-2-3 screen. Makes it faster and easier to select a cell, invoke 

a command or scroll. 

■ POINT EDITOR: a mouse based program editor featuring 
pop-up menus and overlapping, color windows for faster, easier 
file editing. Use it instead of EDLIN or any other ASCII file 
editor. 

THE BEST DEALS: 

WlmtE wl ptUg. ^ Ren.. jms- $199 

A winning combination! LOGIMOUSE enhances the power 

of Ref lex . Borland’s amazing database management system. 

to probe relationships in your data and display them in graphic 

form. 


To place a credit card order 
call our special toll-free number: 


Cal! toll-free 
in California: 


800-231-7717 800-552-8885 


n Introductory Price! 


^wJlCADD-LOGIMOUSE with Plus 
Pkg. & Generic CADD 2.0 with Dot Plot 31>loy 

Everything you need to turn your PC into a CAD workstation. 
Generic CADD has the features and performance of high- 
priced CAD. DotPlot turns your dot matrix printer into a 
plotter.and LOGIMOUSE is the ultimate input device. 


Q t I want America's next favorite mouse! 
1 • Please send me: 


□ LOGIMOUSE with Driver 3.0 S 99 

□ LOGIMOUSE 

with PlusSoftwiire $119 

□ Plus Package Software $ 29 

□ LOGIMOUSE with Reflex $199 

□ LOGICADD $189 

□ LOGIPAINT $169 

R>r your computer model: 


30-Day Money-Back 
Guarantee; 

New 3- Year 
Warranty 

AlU for shipping & 
hunJIing.Ciilif.residenisudJ 
upplicahle sales (ax. 


□ VISA □ MASTERCARD □ CHECK ENCLOSED 


Canf Number 

SIGNATURE. 


CITY. STATE. 


DEALER INQUIRIES WELCOME 

H LOGITECH 


United States: 
LOGITECH. Inc. 

805 Veterans Blvd. 
Redwood City. CA 94063 
tel: 415-365-9852 


In Europe: 
LOGITECH SA 
CH-I143 Apples 
Switzerland 
Tel: 41-21-774545 


atnKMmarfc 


ORCLE 199 ON READER SERVICE CARD 






Eliminate Hardware Hassles 

Wholesale Prices without sacrificing quality, service, technical assistance and warranties. 


FEATURED SOFTWARE 

LOTUS 

1,2,3V2.0 

$303.00 

ASHTON-TATE 

Phase III 

$385.00 

BORLAND 

Turbo Jumbo Holiday Pak . 
Turbo Lightning 

$125.00 
$ 53.00 

MICROSOFT 

WordVS.O 

Chart V2.0 

$219.00 

$144.00 

HARVARD 

Total Project Manager VI. 1 

$245.00 


ORDER TODAY 
1 - 800 - 233-0681 


Technical Assistance 1-402-483-2986 
Customer Service 1-402-483-4735 
Hours: 8 a.m.-5:30 p.m., Mon.-Fri. 


FEATURED HARDWARE 


STB 

EGA Plus $259.00 

AST 

Six Pack Plus, 384K $229.00 

EPSON 

LQ1000 $689.00 

AMDEK 

722 RGB, Enhanced GR . . . $477.00 

PRINCETON 

HX-12E Hires RGB $483.00 

(EGA Compat.) 

EVEREX 

The Edge (Color/Mono) . . . $249.00 


ACCESSORIES 

NEC 

BiOirectiontiTracior 139 00 

Cut Sheet Guide 59 00 

JUKI 

6l00Bi-DirectionTrector 99 00 

6300 Bl-Direcinn Tractor 11900 
PrinterCadte 11 OO 

HARDWARE 

AST 

Six Pack Plus 64K 214 00 

Reach Modem 319 00 

Six Pack phis 3B4K 
S/P/CC 
Rampage Pak 
Meganus64K 
Preview 
MP2. 64K 
Mega Pak 

Advantage lEBK. PC/AT 
l/0Phis1l . Ok/Ser 
jRaffl-2 
TECMAR 
Wave. 64K 
CapUin0K.64K . 

Captain OK. 3B4K 


First M 


a OK 


Graphics Master 
Chautler Color 
Mono Card 

EVENEX 

The Edge Card Color/ 
Monoboard 
Graphcs Edge 
Magic Card (I 
HERCULES 
Color Card with 
parallel Port 
Mono Graphics Card 
GraphX2 0 
IDEA 
Idea 5251 
MTEl 

Above Board 64K for PC . 
Above Board 12BKtorAT 
ack Board lor AT 


229 00 

264 00 

229 00 

230 00 
365 00 
353.00 
120 00 
154 00 

169 00 
145 00 
225 00 
199 00 
429 00 

259 00 


249 00 
245 00 
159.00 


8067-2 8 Mlu 
80287/AT 
KEMSWGTON 
Masterpiece 
Masterpwce Phis 
REYTROMCXmOAROS 
KB5151 or KB51S1 > 
5150 

5 153 Keyboard with 
touch pad 
AT Coni^rter 
MICROSOFT 
Mouse 

Booster with Mouse 
PC Mouse with PC Point 
PC Mouse with Software 
PC Mouse/Ready/ 
PCPoim 

ORCMO TECHNOLOGIES 

PC Turbo 186 W/256K 
PC Turbo Daughter Board 
Ecceli Mullitunction 
Card lor AT 

Conquest Multifunction 
Board OK 

PC Net Oaughier Board 
PC Net Stand alone 
card.64K 
QUAORUM 

Quadlink 

Expanded Quadboard No 
Ram to 384K. OK 
Quadboard 384K 
S/P/CC/G 

QuadcolorlBd4Color 
Gold Quadboard. OK 
sever Ouacnoard. OK 
Liberty Board 64K AT 
Chronograiph 
PaiaNet Inter Board 


135.00 
. 279.00 
.. 39.00 

579 00 

245 00 
355 00 
CALL 
126 00 

136.00 
122 00 


11900 
193 00 
156 00 
136 00 


199 00 

279 00 
169 00 
33900 
192 00 
249.00 
76 00 
64 00 


Efatei (Epson) 

Quad sprint 
Microtater Printer Buff 

RACORE 

Expansion Chassis 
Mus (Jr ) 

Expansion Board 256K 
Persyst Bob Card/Color 
STB 

Chauffer 
E(Up1us 
Graphics Plus II 

THAN 

Acceiieraior 126K 
WESHRN DIGITAL 
10 meg File Card 
Hard Disk 

PARADISE SYSTEMS 

Color Mono Card 
Multi Display Card 
Modular Graphics Card 
Five Pack Muib Card. OK . 
Ser. par & clock Mod-C 
Clock 64K Ram Mod B 


76 00 
405 00 
CALL 


456 00 
176 00 
326 00 

229 00 
259 00 
199 00 


689 00 

119 00 
165 00 
229 00 
159 00 
179 00 
11900 


DRIVES 

EVEREX 

Everdisk 10 Meg Int 525 00 

Everdisk 20 Meg im 575 00 

IOMEGA 

Bernoulli Box 10 Meg 1.729 00 

Bernouki Box 20 Meg 2.335 00 

20 Meg 

Plus . 2.559 00 

10 Meg Cartridge 1 48 00 

79 00 

129.00 

MOUNTAIN 

20 Meg Drive Card 939 00 

10 Meg Dynamic 

Extbisk 1.46900 

SIGMA 

10 Meg Inf Hard 

Drive Kit 724 00 


SUGATE 

tOMegWHt Internal. Ml 439 00 
20 Meg with Controller 
Card A manual 

internal, h 445 00 

20 Meg Internal Hard 
Drive for the AT 

internal. tull 569 00 

30 Meg Internal Hard 
Drive tor the 

AT internal, lull 689 00 

40 Meg Internal 
Hard Drive for the 
AT internal 609 00 

TAU6RASS 

25 Meg Int 845 00 

25MegExt/60Meg 
bi^up 2.399 00 

TANOON 

TM 100-2. full OS 93 00 


FD5SBSV- hall 
height OrrveSMS 
1 2MegVyHT/AT6MS 


AT360K Drive (51^-') 
han height 96 00 


MAYNARD ELECTRONICS 

PC1 10 Meg im. 536 00 

All 20 Meg lot 769 00 


DISKS 

OS/DO DISKS TO OISKS/BDX 
Maxell MO-2 18 00 

\Arbatim Oalabte 18 00 

DS/MGH DENSITY DISK (98TPI) 
Maxwell 36 00 

Verbatim 41 00 


BACKUP 


iRwm 

Tape Backup 10 Meg 

445 00 

TapeBackup20Meg 

EVEREX 

539 00 

60Meglnl Tape Backup . 

796 00 

AUOY 

CALL 

SYS6EN 

CALL 

BUSINESS SOFTWARE 

ALPHA 

Data Base Manager II 

149.00 

Electric Disk PC 

179 00 

Keyworks 

APPUEO son. TECH. 

46 00 

I^salorm XL 

49.00 

ASHTONTATE 

DBase II 128K 

256 00 


395 00 

Framework II . 

345 00 

DBase III 

385 00 

TxneFrame 

29 00 

BPI 

General Accounting 
Accounts Receivable 
Accounts Payable 

F^rol 

Job Costing 

285 00 
285 00 
285 00 
285 00 
285 00 

Inventory 

Busmess Builder 

369 00 

(G/L. A/R. A/P. Payroll. 
Infer Mgi.Spr Sfwtt. 
Bus. Graph and 

Word Processing) 

399 00 

BPS 

Business Graphs 

210 00 

Overhead Express 
EHctronic Checkbook 

120.00 

(Sen Ind ) 

45 00 

BORLAND 

Sidekick 

27.50 

Sidekick non-proiected 

42 50 

Superkey 

34 00 

Turbo Holidav Pack 

67 00 

Turbo Pascal W/B087 . 
Turbo Hohday 

. 53 50 


125 00 

Turbo Pascal W/6CP 

Turbo Pascal 

53 50 

W/B087.BC0 

64.00 

Turbo Pascal 

34 75 

Turbo Lightening 

T urbo Graphics Toolbox 

53.00 
27 50 


27 50 


36.00 


16 50 

Turbo Gameworks 

38 00 

Reflex. TheAnafyst 

BREAKTHROUGH 

59 00 

Timekne . 

229.00 

BROOERFUNO 

Prxitshop 

39.00 

Graphics Librarv 

24 00 

Bank Street Writer 

46 00 

CENTRAL POMT 

Copy II PC or Toots 

22 00 

PC Option Board 

83 00 

CONCEPTUAL MSTRUMENTS 

Desk Organizer 


DIGITAL RESEARCH 

Gem Draw 

89 00 

Gem Collection 

129 00 

CP/M 86 

49 00 

DR Logo 

DOW JONES 

61 00 

Investment Evaluator 

96 00 

Spreadsheet Lxvk 

Market Manager 

139 00 
139.00 

Market Analyzer 

199 00 

Sales SPros^Org 

233 00 


Sideways (New) 39 00 

GRAPHICS COMMUMCATKINS 
GraphicComboSel4.3 306 00 

Freelarice4 3. 187 00 


P C WHOLESALERS of America Inc. 



P.O. BOX 6445, 245 SO. 84TH ST. • LINCOLN, NEBRASKA 68506 











Call 1-800-233-0681 


HMWRDASSOCIATtS 

PCLogo2 0 
HAAIMIO 

T0UIP*0|«Cl 

Manager. VII 245 00 

ProieciManaoef 186 00 

HUMAN EOtf 

The ManMtmtnt Edge 149 00 
TheSaiesEdoe 117 00 

Mnd pTdMr 29 00 


87 00 


Cornerstone 311 00 

Liletree CALL 

lAtRswriter Deluxe 157 00 

VolkswriterScieniifK 287 00 

UVMGVIOEOTECT 
Think Tank 107 00 

Ready 47 00 

LOTUS 

1.2. 3 New Version 303 00 

Symphony 389 00 

INNOVATIVE SOmWUlE 
Smart Software 

System. V3 0 409 00 

ONPOEVELOmENT 
CPA « 328 00 

Marco * 26 00 

Password 26 00 

Rccaic-f 53 00 

QNEAT PLAINS 

Susness Programs 474 00 

HDVUUOSfiFT 

Real Estate AnalyTer II . 21100 

MICM DATA lASf SYSTEMS 

Knowiedgeman11/2 322 00 

MICfMHMAPAX 

PCOraw 19700 

MiemPRO 

Easyl 99 00 

WordStar 189 00 

WordStar 2000 plus 279 00 

WordSUr2000 230 00 

Wordstar Prolessnnai 230 00 

MICfMNtM 

CiouiRBase 119.00 

Extended Report Writer 79 00 

R Base 5000. 1.0. 329 00 

R Base 5000 MulhVG 395 00 

R Base 5000 Mulh 795 00 

MICflOSOFT 

Protect 239 00 

OwckBasc 69 00 

Wndows 59 00 

Macro AsstmMr.V4 0 86 00 

Multiolan.V2 0 109 00 

Accau 153 00 

Word.V30 21900 

ChartEO 144 00 

Busmess Basie Compiler 247 00 
CCompMr 224 00 

Chan 143 00 

Com Compeer 365 00 

Fortran Compeer 201 00 

Mouse 107 00 

Pascal Compiler 173 00 

Word 21000 

MiCNOSTUFf 

Crosstalk. V4 0 93 00 

Remote. V3 1 93 00 

Transporter. V1.4 14500 

MONOORAM 

OoUarsASense 9500 

MULTIMATE 

Munmate. V3 31 . 209 00 

Muthmate Advantage 
V3 31 249 00 

OPEN SYSTEMS 

P/0 Sales. A/R.6/L. 

Inv . A/P. 

TeamMartager 293 00each 

PEACHTREE 

A/R.G/L.A/P. 

PR. 1C 275 00eeeh 

Backlo8as«s.V1.02 .. 190 00 
POWER BASE SYSTEMS 
Power Base 184 00 

REAL WORLD 
A/P.G/L.A/R.OE 
orINV 293 O0eacA 

ROSESOFT 

Prokey4 0 69 00 


Samna * Wbrk 

Processmg 359 00 

Word III 329 00 

SATELLITE SOFTWARE-SSI 
Wordpenect. V4 1 . 19400 

SOFTWARE ARTS 
TKI Solver 215 00 

SOmHUE GROUP 

Enable. VII 325 00 

SOFTWARE PUBUSHM6 
PFS fUt. Write. Graph 
and Sell 69 00each 

PFS Prootor Access 49 00eKh 

PFS Report 64 00 

SORCIM 

Easywrner 188 00 

Supercaiciii 184 00 

Superproiect 281 00 

Accounting Programs 281 00 

SUMMIT 

Bener Basic 120 00 

Birievt Interlace 65 00 

Math Module 

6087/80287 65 00 

RunTime 153 00 

XANARO 

Ability 256 00 

GAMES « EDUCATIONAL 
SOFTWARE 

ATI 

Stoll Budders 25 00 

Training Power 4100 

SARRONS 

Computer SAT 52 00 

BLUE BUSH 

Chess 35 00 

SLUE CHIP 

Millionaire 29 00 

Tycoon 29 00 

Barron 29 00 

SQuire 39 00 

BROOERBUHO 

Lode Runner . 20 00 

Ancient Art of War 25 00 

CBS SOFTWARE 

MasieruHIt'NSAT 53 00 

Gorens Bridge & Easy 4100 

CO» 

Trammg tor WordStar 36 00 


27 00 
27 00 
37 00 
27 00 


Math Blaster 
WordAnack 

Speed Reader II 

SpetiR 
HATOEN 
Holy Grail 

Sargonili 

NUMARE06E 
Communicainn Edge 
Management Edge 
Mindnobe . . 
Negotiation Edge 
SatesEoge 
MOIVIOUAL 
Professor DOS 
The Instructor 
Professor Pixel 
Tutorial Set 
Typing Irrstruclor 
KOAU 
Koala Pad 

LEARHMGCOMPANT 

Additton Magic 

Magic Spells 

Word Spinner 

Number Stumper 

Reader Rabbit 

awcHcmiFT 

Fight Simulator. V2 12 . 


HeBcalAce 
Spitfire Ace 
F-ISFkgK 
Soto Right 
SrterR Service 


95 00 
124 00 
26 00 
143 00 
123 00 

34 00 
23 00 
37 00 
57 00 
.27 00 

84 00 

19 00 
19 00 
1900 
23 00 
23 00 

.27 00 

25 00 
25 00 
25 00 
25 00 
25 00 


Bulk) a Book 


Boston Dwt 

55 00 

Masieftype 

23 00 

Run tor S 

28 00 

Song Wril«r 

28 00 

Not Wbfit) 

69 00 

INFOCON 


CuflhroHS 

23 00 

OOAdtme 

25 00 

SMStHkor 

23 00 

Enchanter 

23 00 

Wishbnngtr 

23 00 

Wrtrwss 

23 00 

SuspenbM 

25 00 

Forbidcton Quest 

23 00 

Infidel 

27 00 

A Mmd Forever 

25 00 

Suspect 

25 00 

Zorkl.il or III 

25 00 each 

SPINNACKER 


Alphabet Zoo 

CALL 

Kinder Camp 

CALL 

Slot Machtrte 

CALL 

Face Maker 

CALL 

Hey OiOdic Diddle 

CALL 

KidWrMer 

1700 

Rhymes! Rtddies 

16 00 

Story Machme 

1700 

Snooper Troops 1. 2 

lOOOtKh 

Delta Drawing 

26 00 

Most AmamgThmg 

21 00 


MONITORS 

AMOEK 

Video 300 Green 
Video 300 Amber 
Video 310Amber 
(IBMType) 

Color 300 (New) 
CompoMc 
Color 600INCW) 

High Res 
Color 700 (New) 

Ultra High Res 
Color 710 (New) 
with Non-glare 
Color 722 RGB 
Enhanced Graphics 
PRINCETON 
HX-9 High Res 
RGB Color 
HX-12 High Res 
RGB Color 
HX-12E1^Re$ 

RGB Color 
MAX-12E High Res 
Amber 

SR-12SuprHigh 
Res Color 
OUAMUM 
Quadchrome 


137 00 
217 00 
374 00 
403 00 
423 00 
477 00 

367 00 
413 00 
483 00 
149 00 
541 00 

295 00 
CALL 


PRINTERS 

CITOH 

Prownter 7500 
Slarwnier 10-30 


167 00 
457 00 
CALL 


anzDi 

MSP 10 (80 Cot) 

MSP 15 (132 Col) 

MSP 20 (80 Col) 

MSP 25(132 Col) 
Pramiere3S(LQ) 
OAISYWMTER 
2000 
usno 

808 Dot Matrix 100 cps 

1080DMMainx100cps 

1360 Dot MNnx 130 Cps 

1385 Dot Matru IBScps 

PANAMMIC 

KX1091 

KX1092 

KX1592 

KX1S95 


239 00 
379 00 
329 00 
504 00 
439 00 

729 00 

179 00 
259 00 
289 00 
339 00 

239 00 
349 00 
469 00 
659 00 


LX 80 

205 00 

U(90w/picscard 

249 00 

FX85 

CALL 

Fxias 

CALL 

JX 80 color prmler 

535 00 

OX 10 Letter Quairtv 

CALL 

OX 20 Lener OualiN 

CALL 

OX 35 Letter OuaMy 

CALL 

LO 800 Letter Quality 

LQ 1000 Letter 

CALL 


689 00 

L0 1500 Parallel 

925 00 

FX286 

550 00 

SQ 2000 ink Jet 

CALL 

BROTHER 

DM40-P 

926 00 


134 00 

HR15XL 

324 00 

HRISTradOr 

92 50 

HR 25 

449 00 

HR 25 Tractor 

109 00 

HR3S 

659 00 

HR 35 Tractor 

109 00 

CAMMH 

A40 

CALL 

LBP-SAI Laser 

CALL 

DIABLO 

0-25 Daisywheel 

547 00 

635 Daisywheel 

1.089 00 

OBOlFOaisywheel 

620 Daisywheel 

295 00 
589 00 

Advantage 025 

589 00 

OnOATA 

Microtme 84'(200cps) 
MtcrowieSApwtoi car 

Microkne 18z 

629 00 
669 00 
209 00 

Microlmc1825 

249 00 

Mrerokne 163'( 120 Cps) 

369 00 

Microimt t92-(160cps) 

323 00 

Microbnt 193-(160cpS) 

459 00 

Mrerokne 2410p 

1.689 00 

Okimate with tractor 

184 00 

Ouretwriter 

1.023 00 

PtO Primer 

449 00 

KEC 

NEC2050.20CPS 

659 00 

NEC 3530. 35 cos 

949 00 

NEC3550.35CPS 

989 00 

NEC88S0.55CPS 

1.429 00 

jun 

Juki61IX). IScps 

339 00 

Juki6200.30cpS 

499 00 

Juki 6300. 40 Cps 

644 00 

TOSMM 

P1340 Primer (80 col) 

389 00 

P341 Printer (136 col ) 

695 00 

P3S1 Printer (136eol ) 

1.009 00 

MODEMS 


AST 

Reach imernal 1200 

299 00 

HAYS 

Smarlmodem 1200 


external 

Smarlmodem 12006 

359 00 

eiternai 

Smarlmodem 2400 

320 00 

external 

Smartmodem 24006 

569 00 

internal 

529 00 

Transei 1000 

259 00 

N0VRT10H 

Access 123-12006 
Smancal Plus 1200 

356 00 

standalone 

299 00 

2400SlanoatorM 

Software 

Haft Card 2400 

525 00 


469 00 

HafI Card 2400 

419 00 

PROMETHEUS 

Pro-Modem 1200 

295 00 

Pro-Modem 12<)06 

249 00 

US ROBOTICS 

Cour«r2400 

425 00 

COMPinE SYSTEMS 

COMPLETE SYSTEM 


PRICES 

CALL 


FREE SHIPPING on all orders 
over $500.00. Orders shipped 
UPS ground unless specified 
otherwise and shipping 
charges included with order. 
For cards, drives, monitors 
and printers, please add 2 V 2 % 
for UPS ground. Add $4.50 to 
all other orders. Call for other 
2nd day or overnight rates. 
Call for rates outside 
Continental USA. 

FREE ASSISTANCE FROM 
EXPERIENCED TECHNICAL 
CONSULTANTS available to 
assist you in purchasing, 
installing and support of your 
system. 

QUANTITY DISCOUNTS 

available — call. Prices and 
availability subject to change 
without notice. If prices are 
lower after your order is 
received but before it is 
shipped you will receive a 
refund for the difference. All 
items in inventory are shipped 
within 48 hrs. of receipt 
of order. 

Allow at least two weeks for personal 
and corporate checks to dear before 
shipment. Allow 5% processing 
charge for Visa & Master Charge. 

For faster shipping send cashier's 
check or money order. 

OUR POLICY 

We do not guarantee machine 
compatibility. All products are new 
and indude fadory warranty, there- 
fore ALL sales are final. Defective 
software will be replaced by the same 
item only. Defective hardware will be 
replaced or repaired at our discretion. 
Prices and availability subject to 
change without notice. Produds 
purchased in error, subject to 20% 
restocking fee. All returns must have 
an authorization number. Call 
(402) 483-4735 to obtain one before 
returning defedive produds 
for replacement. 

Not responsible for typographic 
pricing errors. 


Buy Factory Direct and Save 

CIRCLE 241 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



■ BACKUP SOFTWARE 


BackRest 

BackResi may be flexible, but it is also one 
of the slowest and least-friendly programs 
reviewed here. Its flexibility, rate of 


speed, and interface are all related, the 
common thread being three letters: CP/M. 

BackResl's flexibility lies in what it 
calls control files. Because each file en- 
ables you to specify paths and files, you 


can customize your backup and restore op- 
erations. You can exclude files either by 
declaring them exceptions or by excluding 
the path the file lies in from the control file. 
You create a control file either with an edi- 



23outcf24. 


The Billion Dollar Club. An elite group that handles the biggest 
projects in the world. 

Last year, according to Engineering News-Record, only 24 companies 
made it. 


23 of them use Primavera Project Planner. 

Primavera offers the capability to handle projects with up to 10,000 
activities. Coupled with the flexibility provided by features like 20 
activity codes per project, choice of i-J or precedence formats, 
interactive and batch modes for data entry, resource leveling, even 
on-screen bar charts and histograms. 

Not to mention our extensive reporting functions that help you create 
exception reports, summary reports or selective focus reports at any 
level of detail. 

Send for our $35 demo and see for yourself. 

WeTe helping 23 top companies manage their projects more effectively. 
Isn't it time we did the same tor you? 


Project management software 
that works as hard as you do. 



PRIMAVERA SYSTEMS. INC. 


Suite 925 • Two Bala Plaza • Bala Cynwyd. PA 1900» *(215) 667-8600 • Telex : 910 997 0484 


Primavera project manaRement software: 

Primavera Project Planner • Finest Hour (hourly scheduling and multiple calendars) 
Primavision (optional plotter graphics) • Available for MS-DOS and VAX environments 
Source: ENR Construction Economics Dept.. Engineering News-Record. Issue Date: April 18. 1985. 


tor or with the installation program. 

Because you must tell BackResi your 
paths, you do a lot of entering by hand; a 
utility that automatically finds and then 
pops them into the control file after a con- 
firmation is much needed. 

BackRest failed to back up PC Labs’ 
10-megabyte test file after 4 hours and 40 
floppies’ worth of trying. The error report 
showed trouble while verifying the back- 
ups. BackRest took another 2 hours to re- 
store 28 of those floppies before it crashed 
because of lack of room for its report file. 

BackRest's tortoiselike speed and un- 
friendly installation overshadow any of its 
benefits. I recommend BackRest only if 
you want to devote a good part of your life 
to using it. Giil 


Vincent Puglia is a frequent contributor to 
PC Magazine. 



FACT 


FILE 


Bakup, Versioa 3.04 
Software Integration Inc. 
9800 S. Sepulveda 
Blvd..#310 
Los Angeles, CA 90045 
(213)776-3404 
List Price: $179.95 
Reqi^: )28KRAM, 
hard disk drive, floppy disk drive. 

In Short: Bakup is a friendly, easy-to-use, 
and reliable backup pfx)gram with some mi- 
nOT drawbacks — nxisi iK)tably copy protec- 
tion. 

CIFCLE WON READER SERVICE CARO 



BackRest, 

Version 2.1 
Stok Software 
17 W. 17th St. 

New York. NY 1001 1 
(212)243-1444 
List Price: $180 
Requires: 128K RAM. 
hard di^ drive, floppy disk drive. 

In Short: BackRest, an extremely flexible 
backup and restore program, suffers from its 
slow speed and unfriendly interface. Not 
copyprotected. 

CIRCLE WON READER SERVICE CARD 



CIRCLE 187 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
352 





§ Productivity 


I PC LAB NOTES: DESKTOP ORGANIZERS ■ WINN L. ROSCH 


Give your pc 

ADDED UTILITY 


Short batch files and programs using DOS and BASIC let your PC Junction as a notepad and 
calculator, fiiui and dial phone numbers, and set up your printer’s features. 


M any of the capabilities that desk- 
top utility programs normally 
supply are built into your PC. al- 
beit on a rudimentary level . Without much 
work you can write short batch files or pro- 
grams, using only DOS and the BASIC 
language that you already have, to take ad- 
vantage of your PC's hidden powers for 
quick note-taking, calculating, finding 
phone numbers, and dialing. 

These quick, home-brew utilities won't 
rival the commercial products in power. 
Because they lack RAM residence, you 
can't call them up from within another pro- 
gram. for example. Writing RAM-resi- 
dent programs requires some expertise in 
assembly language because you must load 
the program into memory, reserve the 
memory to the program, and revector in- 
terrupts in order to enter the program from 
within another. These quick programs can 
be useful, however, either as they .stand or 
as the foundation for writing your own cus- 
tomized utilities. 

THE INSTANT NOTEBOOK The 

notebook is probably the most popular 
add-on utility, useful whenever you need 
to write a quick note and don't want to 
bother loading a word processor, selecting 
a file, and resetting all the defaults. Mak- 
ing a notebook out of your PC is easy be- 
eause you can let DOS do all the work. All 
you need to do is copy what you type at the 
keyboard into a permanent disk file that 
you can read, review, or edit when you get 
a chance. 

Moving the characters that you type 
into a file requires only a single command 


using the internal DOS function COPY. 
The only difference between using COPY 
to duplicate files and to take notes is that 
you must tell DOS to copy from the key- 
board instead of from a file. DOS calls the 
eombination of keyboard and monitor 
CON (for CONsole), so the command to 
copy what you type to a file, called FILE- 
NAME in this example, would be as fol- 
lows: 

COPY CON FILENAME 

DOS will let you type as much as you 
want — up to the limit of the space avail- 
able on your destination disk. Then, when 
you are through entering text, you must tell 
DOS you're done by typing an "end-of- 


PRODIKTIVITY INDEX 


PC I.AB NO I'ES 
Use IX)S to dial, set up a printer, do 
math, and take notes. 
PROflRAMMING/iriTLiriES 
Programs to explore EGA iikkIcs. vid- 
eo pages, colors, palettes, and borders 
SPREADSHEET CLINIC 
/-2-.I tips, a novel use of Ctt NA, and a 
2.()buufix 
POWER I SER 

Croxsltilk colors. WonlSuir borders, 
and Word Perfect envelopes 
l'SER-1 0-liSER 
Call-Waiting Zap|x-r. PAUSE 
refinements. BASIC debugging tips 
PC Tl'TOR 

Ixam about the V20 chip, printer 
fomi-feeds. and date sorting. 


file" character. Ctrl-Z or ASCII 26. Do 
this at the end of your note by .starting a 
new line, pressing F6 (or Ctrl and Z at the 
same time), then pressing Enter. Your typ- 
ing will immediately be copied to disk. 
You can later use the DOS TYPE com- 
mand to review it or edit the text using your 
nonnal editor or word prixessor. 

DOS automatically erases whatever old 
FILENAME existed before creating the 
new one. so the simple instruction won't 
let you add notes to an existing file. How- 
ever, you can easily mtxJify the command 
to do that by telling DOS to append your 
new typing to an existing file. The follow- 
ing command line dixs exactly that, con- 
catenating what you type at the keybtrard 
to the end of the file called FILENAME, 
calling the new file by the old file's name: 

COPY FILENAME-rCON FILENAME 

Note that DOS will echo each file or de- 
vice name on your display as it starts to 
copy to disk, but the screen appearances of 
these names will not find their way into the 
final file you create. If FILENAME does 
not exist when you first use this command, 
don't worry. DOS will create it as it goes 
along. 

You'll probably want to put this simple 
instruction into a batch file to make it even 
easier to use. I recommend a file called 
LOG. BAT, so you can keep a running log 
of your notes. To create such a batch file, 
type in the following (hitting the Enter key 
at the end of each line), 

COPY CON LOG. BAT <Enter> 

COPY LOG.DOC+CON LOG. DOC <Enter> 
“Z (fii F6)<Enter> 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
353 




I‘ R O I) U C T I V I T V 


■ PC LAB NOTES 


and DOS will respond with "I Filc(s) 
Copied." 

This meihrxl of taking notes dixts have 
its shortcomings. You’ll miss the little ex- 
tras that word processors give you. like 
word wrap, and you'll probably find that 
editing is somewhat limited — specifically, 
to the backspace key. 

QUICK-AND-DIRTY DIRECTORY 

You can turn your PC into an on-line tele- 
phone directory by using the DOS FIND 
command (in DOS 2.0 or later). Unlike 
COPY, which is always available when 
DOS is running, the program FIND.EXE 
(included on your DOS disk) must be lo- 
cated in the current directory or within the 
search path specified hy your most recent 
PATH command for this feature to work 
properly. 

The FIND program reads characters 
from files and compares them with a string 
that is input to the command. If it finds a 
match, it echoes the entire line containing 
the target string to the .screen. Thus, if you 
store in a disk file a list of individuals’ 
names, company affiliations, telephone 
numbers, and a short note or nickname for 
each one — each complete entry on its own 
line — you can use FIND to search the file 
and display the entire line of information 
about an individual when a match is found 
with any part of an entry. 

In my telephone storage system (which 
I .still use despite having SideKick on-line). 
I call this batch file#. BAT. The telephone 
directory I use with it lists each individ- 
ual’s name first, followed by his telephone 
number, his company affiliation, and an- 
other key word or two — a nickname or a 
product . That way I can use it as a quick- 
and-dirty database that allows me to find 
the names and numbers of people and 
products with a few keystrokes directly 
from the DOS prompt. For instance, if I 
want to find listings for all the makers of 
hard disks to do research for a story. I ju.st 
type 

# Winchester 

and a dozen names and numbers pop up on 
the screen. 

To make the FIND command into an 
easy-to-use telephone directory, you need 
to create two files — the directory itself, in 
which one line is devoted to each entry. 


and a short batch file, which consists of ex- 
actly one line. Assuming a telephone di- 
rectory called PHONE. NOS on your hard 
di.sk. drive C:. the contents of the entire 
batch file would be as follows: 

FIND "%1" C: PHONE. NOS 

To create this batch file and call it 
#.BAT. type the following at the DOS 
prompt: 

COPY CON I.BAT <Enter> 

FIND "%1” CrPHONE.NOS <Enter> 

“Z (cx F6)<Enter> 

When you use this batch file. DOS sub- 
stitutes the name you input after the batch 
file name for the I in the command, then 
searches the file PHONE. NOS for a 


■ You can turn your PC 
into an on-line 
telephone directory by 
using the DOS FIND 
command included with 
DOS 2.0 or later. 


match, and echos each hit to the screen. Of 
course, since every match is echoed to the 
screen, when you kxtk for Bill, you’ll find 
every Bill you know or owe. 

You can build the file PHONE. NOS 
using your text editor (prtwiding it is capa- 
ble of creating standard ASCII files) or the 
DOS COPY command, as shown for the 
log file above. Note that FIND is case sen- 
sitive. so if you type 

# Paul 

it won’t find a name entered as PAUL. 
Moreover, it will find words embedded in 
other words, yanking RON from ELEC- 
TRONICS but not Ron from Elecironic.s. 

DIALING FOR MISERS Once the 
numbers are displayed. I u.se Suh-Kirk's 
auto-dialer to pull a particular number off 
the screen and dial it. 

If you don’t have SideKick or another 


COPY CON DIAL.BAT 
MODE 00Ml;12eB 

ECHO ATDT %1 %2 %3 %4 »5 >C0M1: 
PAUSE 

ECHO ATH > COMl: 

*Z 


Rgure 1 : A tftiick way to diai from the DOS 
prompt. You type DIAL and the number you 
want. The pttrameters (Sk I . %2, ete.}are 
replaced with the phone number. You need 
several because DOS treats anythiitf; set off by 
a .vpace as a .separate parameter. 9. 1 212 
555 12 1 2 would he the first four: the fifth would 
be iftnored. 

program with a built-in dialer, you can 
make your own phone dialer with a batch 
file (your own will require you to retype 
the phone numbers — it won’t read and dial 
them from the screen, as SideKick docs). 
In the April 29 PC Lab Notes (Volume 5 
Number 8). M. David Stone outlined sev- 
eral quick schemes to take advantage of the 
auto-dialing capabilities in your modem. 

The tricks involved are simple. First 
you must set up the communications port 
to which your modem is connected (using 
DOS’s MODE command) so that the mo- 
dem will understand the codes sent to it. 
Then you must echo the proper dialing in- 
structions to the modem port. 

In Figure I . this procedure is refined by 
adding a pause command, which makes 
your PC wait until you press a key. then a 
command to make the modem hang up. so 
you don’t have to share the phone line with 
it. This file a,ssumes you have a Hayes- 
compatible modem. 

See Stone’s earlier article for more re- 
finements and details about customizing 
this utility for your needs. 

QUICK CALCULATIONS In the long 
years before SideKick. I used my PC as a 
desktop calculator by dropping into BA- 
SIC and using its immediate mode for cal- 
culations. All it takes is entering into BA- 
SIC and giving a PRINT command — or, 
better yet. the abbreviation (question 
mark) and the math problem that needs to 
be solved. 

For quick answers, BASIC is not diffi- 
cult to use. In fact, it can be a pleasure: un- 
like many calculators, BASIC adores stan- 
dard algebraic notation and deftly handles 
multiple parentheses. 

For instance, if you wanted to find out 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST I9K6 
,t54 


INTRODUCING THE WORLD’S 
FIRST PERSONAL LINE PRINTER. 


trow °'‘*/anVO''®'®fortatolV 

•rrte « prin'^-°'"Sirst tiw® comtor’^ 

. an act'^a’- P the that tt 

, e l°°'^^’'?ine a li"® chnol°P'^' 

patented 

on the cotXi ^„rizih9 -...«n s° ^® = „ters. ^ne 

^.. miniat'*^. h 


■ re X°°'^^"?ine Ptintef -.tne 

patented 

on the coth izihP “"l/oveh so ^^mters^ ^ the I*'”" 

a,d it PV “"toov tP®^‘'rinic°”'P"""'is super t°t 

'^at»e P®=''aih£f®'”® “ our pria”"^ opera- 

.*. can * .^1 


comes to ^3triz P ''®’'cae pr^P'^^artridga®,^ tith a 

a®’'"® an’t dratt ““finVi" =“niabi° 63 ° ^^ndlihg- 

riht-oht P® atures hPM- - and the paP®^, yoh 

this ^Standard fe litv at PQ'^tnd tti®"°”For kn at 

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T’O ■*■ ,,T- 

TtJft** ^ ,e about our 

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t. VOU-r®r,nVoO-S3«;^«rKrespo;fUheP’^^^^^^ 

„e seeh ®"°'^finter - ^“^,^00 tor ^ Persona 

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J' personal ht mail ^hable 

r-".f «r.vs.- *• * ...»<;f“r.v- 



r D Please send me more information on the Printronix Ftersonal 
I Line Printer. 

I □ Please have a sales representative contact me. 


n 


Name 

Company. 
Street 


City. 


State. 


L 


Zip Tfel 

Mail Tb: Printronix. Inc., PO. Box 19559. M/S C-9. Irvine. CA 
92713. Phone 800/826-3874. In California. 800/826-7559. 


J 


PRIlVFRONIK 


Proprinter is a trademark and IBM is a registered trademark of International Business 
Machines Coro. Diablo is a trademark of XEROX CORPORATION. LQ-lSOO is a 
trademark and Epson is a registered trademark of Epson America. Inc. Printronix 
is a registered trademark of Printronix. Inc. < 1986. Printronix Inc. 


Corporate/ U.S. A. Headquarters; Printronix. Inc.. PO. Box 19559. 17500 Cartwright Rd.. Irvine. CA 92713. Iblephone; (714) 863-1900. 'felex: 910-595-2535. European Headquarters: 
Printronix Europe S. A.. Boulevard du ^uverain 100, 1170 Brussels. ^lgium.1biephone:(32) 2-660-2904. '^ex: 20643 PRINTR B. 


CIRCLE 316 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


P K O D U C I I V 1 I Y 


■ PC LAB NOTES 


100 CLS:LOCATE 1,1 

110 PRINT "Deo. Hex. Char Dec. Hex. Char" 

120 FOR X=2 TO 15 STEP 2 
130 LOCATE 3,1 

140 FOR y=l TO 16 

150 A=(X*16)+(Y-1) :B=(X*16)+(Y+15) 

160 PRINT USING "t#*";A; 

170 PRINT TAB(6);HEX$(A);TAB(11);CHR$(A);TAB(21); 

180 PRINT USING "♦#f";B; 

190 PRINT TAB(26) ;HEX$(B) ;TABt31) ;CHR$(B) 

200 NEXT y 

210 A$=INKEYS: IP AS- "" THEN 210 

220 NEXT X 
230 END 


Figure 2: The ASCII table written in BASIC. If you want to refer to it while in BASIC, renumber it 
starting with 9000. When you want to see the table without disturbing your program, type RUN 
9000<Enter>. 


the sales tax on the purchase ol a personal 
eomputer (assuming the price to be 
$2.499.9.5 and the tax rate 6.5 percent), 
you could just type 

? 2499. 95*. 065 

and BASIC would respond with the an- 
sweryouneed: 162.4967. 


ASCII CHARACTER TABLE When 
pmgramming. I used to find niysell paging 
through the BASIC manual in search of the 
particular ASCII ctxlc I needed to display a 
character on the screen. TtxJay the manual 
rests undisturbed on the shelf because I use 
a utility program to pop up an ASCII table 
when I need it. 


You can get the same result with the 
simple BASIC program shown in Figure 
2. The program displays the decimal AS- 
CII ctxlc for characters .32 and above, their 
hexadecimal equivalent, and the equiva- 
lent character that is displayed on the 
screen when using the CHR$ function in 
BASIC. 

I chose to start the table at 32 for simpli- 
city’s sake. Starting there avoids the need 
to trap the under-32 control cixies that up- 
set the neat order of the table and that clear 
the screen. 

Althtmgh this program won't pop up 
from inside an applications program, as 
will its commercial kin. you cun add a bit 
of simulated concurrency to it by renum- 
bering its lines to start at 9000 (or so) and 
saving it as an ASCII file by adding the .A 
option to the BASIC SAVE command. 
Then, when you are programming in BA- 
SIC. you can merge the table into tbe pro- 
gram you're working on with few ill ef- 







• FOR vem MS: DOS t PC: DOS MACHINES 

• CUSTOMIZED FOR YOUR INDUSTRY 

• SO DAY MONEY RACIl GUARANnE 
(tass poitatt ft bandtifig) 

•FREE SUPPORT 


ACCOUNTING SOFTWARE 

* 69.95 


A Complete Accounting System 
For Your Specific Industry '' 


TO ORDER CALL: 

(IN PA)1-S(X)-551-ROSE 
(OUT OF PA) 1 -800-553-ROSE 
FOR MORE INFO. 215-443*702fi 


GENERAL SYSTEM 

CONSTRUCTION 

RETAIL SALES 

FQIIIPMFNT RFNTAI j 

MAIL USTMQMT 

ACCTS RECEIVABLE 
ACCTS PAYABLE 
PAYROLL 

INVENTORY 

ORDER ENTRY 
PURCHASE ORDER 
GENERAL LEDGER 

$69.95 

JOB COST 

ACCTS RECEIVABLE 
ACCTS PAYABLE 
PAYROLL 

INVENTORY 

PURCHASE ORDER 

BIO PREPARATION 

PURCHASE ORDER 
ACCTS RECEIVABLE 
ACCTS PAYABLE 
PAYROLL 

INVENTORY 

ORDER ENTRY 

MAIL LIST MGMT 

RENTAL BILLING 
ACCTS RECEIVABLE 
ACCTS PAYABLE 
PAYROLL 

INVENTORY 
PURCHASE ORDER 
MAIL LIST MGMT 
GENERAL LEDGER 

$69.95 

NAME 

j ADDRESS 

1 CITY STATE ZIP 

$69.95 

$69.95 

1 

1 VISA MC AMEX 






PROFESSIONAL 

MANUFACTURING 

WHOLESALE SALES 

MEDICAL BILUNG 

1 FXP DATE 

TIME BILLING 

ACCTS RECEIVABLE 

JOB TRACKING 
ACCTS RECEIVABLE 
ACCTS PAYABLE 
PAYROLL 

PURCHASE ORDER 
INVENTORY 

ORDER ENTRY 

810 PREPARATION 
GENERAL LEDGER 

$69.95 

PURCHASE ORDER 
ACCTS RECEIVABLE 
ACCTS PAYABLE 
PAYROLL 

ORDER ENTRY 

MAIL LIST MGMT 
GENERAL LEDGER 
INVENTORY 

$69.95 

3rd PARTY BILLING 
ACCTS RECEIVABLE 
ACCTS PAYABLE 
PAYROLL 

INVENTORY 

MAILLIST MGMT 
PATIENT HISTORY 
GENERAL LEDGER 

$69.95 

1 CARO 1 

PAYROLL 

PURCHASE ORDER 
ORDER ENTRY 
MAILLIST MGMT 
GENERAL LEDGER 

$69.95 

j COMPUTER TYPE 
j SYSTEM DESIRED 

1 INCk |7 M ron POStAGI t HANOlING 

I PA BfsiDeNCfAooe*-. 5Ai.es TA» 

1 FOP MORf INFO Cali ;«5-a4.3 nn 

CIRCLE 130 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


ROSE ASSOCIATES 
2005 FAIR OAKS AVE. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
356 


OUR NEW n-FAGE 
USER PRMTER B NUSSING 
ONE VERY EXPENSIVE FUTURL 

1HE IHAHnENANCE IHAN. 


Our clamshell design with modular com- 
ponents makes operator-maintenance 
easy. And our exclusive change-it-yourself 
fusing station eliminates a major overhaul 
or total printer replacement. So you can 
maintain it right in the office, and keep 
right on printing. While you keep ^ 
out the maintenance man. 

High performance features 
keep the Personal Laser Printer 
a step ahead of your workload. 

Its compact size fits your desk 
and your personal printing 
needs perfectly. It prints up to 
12 pages per minute with out- 
standing resolution (300 dpi) 
for both text and graphics. It 
emulates the H-P Laseijet, H-P 
Laserjet Plus, Epson FX-80 and 
Diablo 630, with a variety of 
type fonts. Select from two out- 
put choices to stack your sheets 
in either original or reversed 
order. TWo paper sizes, letter 
and legal, to suit your job. And 
two input trays let you handle 
300 sheets at one time, or mix 
different papers - including letter- 
head, envelopes, and label stock. 

But there is one other expen- 
sive feature we’re missing. A big 


Dublo is a tiademarit of XEROX CORPORATION. FX-80 is a tnuJemark and 
Epwn is a renstered tiademark of Epson America. Inc. Printronii is a 


/ 

I 

\ 


I 

I 

I 


price tag. At only $2995’* you’ll get more 
printer than the H-P Laseijet Plus for about 
$1000 less. 

YOU’LL NEVER KNOW WHAT 
^ YOU’RE MISSING 
% IF YOU DON’T ASK. 


Epwn IS a registered tiademark of E] 
i^gisteied truemark of Printronix, Ii 

f )' 1986 E’rintroniz. (nc. 



PRINTRONIX 

Corporate/U.&A. Headquarters: Printronix Inc., RO. 
Box 19559, 17500 Cartwright Rd., Irvine, CA 92713, 
Telephone: (714) 863-1900, Tfelex: 910-595-2535. Euro- 
pean Headquarters: Printronix Europe S.A.. Boule- 
vard du Souverain 100, 1170 Brussels, Belgium.'ftlephone: 
(32) 2-660-2904, Tfelex: 20643 PRINTR B. 

CIRCLE 317 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PRODUCTIVITY 

■ PC LAB NOTES 


COMMERCIAL DESKTOP 
ORGANIZERS: MEMORY- 
RESIDENT UTILITIES 

Quite a bit more polished than home-brew utilities, 
these programs vary in the features they offer 
and differ in their ease of use. 


O nce you've dclemiined that a set of 
desktop utilities will make your life 
easier, you have a wide array of commer- 
cial programs from which to choose. 
Here is a quick look at several of the 
more popular programs available for 
adding functions to your PC. 

HOMEBASE 

While most desktop utilities are primari- 
ly oriented around their notepad func- 
tions. Homeha.se puts primary emphasis 
on its database functions. Its internal da- 
tabase is powerful enough so that if you 
don't make genuinely heavy demands on 
your data storage and reporting pro- 
grams. you might just use A/ wnt'/w.ve. in- 
stead of a dedicated database. 

Besides its general-purpose database 
features. Homeha.se includes prefabricat- 
ed templates for common desktop orga- 
nizer features like a message pad and ad- 
dress book. The user interface is 
exemplary — even flashy — presenting a 
combination of horizontal menus and 
zooming vertical bar menus. 

Homelxi.se also includes the standard 
desktop calendar and calculator features. 
The Homehase editor is designed to 
mimic the WordStar editor. Its only 
drawback is its lack of full word-proces- 
sor printing abilities. Homehase\ com- 
munications abilities go beyond mere di- 
aling and include full terminal 
emulation. In addition, the program also 
allows you to issue several DOS com- 
mands from within other applications, 
puts a continuously running (annoying 
but removable) clix;k in the upper-right- 
hand comer of the screen, and blanks 
your monitor if you don't pre.ss a key for 
more than 15 minutes. 


Homehase is not completely memory 
resident; it requires the use of an overlay 
file to cany out some of its functions. Al- 
though this programming design saves 
memory and docs not interfere with call- 
ing up the program from within other ap- 
plications. it makes hard-disk operation 
of this utility preferable. 

PC-DESK 

PC-De.sk is more like an elementary inte- 
grated program than a set of desktop utili- 
ties. The package includes a simplified 
address database, a word prtxresstir. a 
calculator, a timekeeping lug. and a cal- 
endar and reminder system. The format 
of each record in the address database is 
factory preset and allows you to keep a 
wealth of information beyond merely 
name/address/telephone. Up to 200 re- 
cords can be kept in a single file. Since it 
has most popular editing functions, its 
word proces.sor facility can be used for 
more than just taking notes. It allows you 
to print letters, envelopes, and mailing 
labels. 

The other PC-De.sk features, howev- 
er. simply seem to have been grafted on. 
The calendar advances and retreats solely 
month by month. The calculator, al- 
though it works admirably, has a few 
bugs. For iastancc. a number that's lot) 
large spills over onto the next line of the 
screen long before an error message pops 
up. leaving numbers scattered across the 
screen that don't go away until you enter 
another full-screen function. Installation 
options are minimal. But perhaps the big- 
gest shortcoming of PC-De.sk is that it 
cannot be made RAM resident. It won't 
pop up in another program when you 
need it. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 19 
.M8 


POP-tPDESKSET 

Unlike other utility packages, the Pop- 
Up De.skSei is not one program but a set 
of utilities that can be separately loaded 
(and unloaded) from your system. These 
utilities consist of all the expected desk- 
top organizing functions, including an 
alarm cluck, a notepad, a calculator (and 
a feature-packed tmancial calculator), a 
calendar, a dialer, and. optionally, a tele- 
communications facility. In addition, the 
basic package aLso contains a pop-up util- 
ity that allows you to issue DOS com- 
mands from within other applications. It 
also contains another utility that permits 
putting one application on hold and run- 
ning a second application by loading an- 
other copy of (foMMAND.COM, thus 
creating a new DOS. 

One wonderful blessing of the mtxlu- 
larity of the Pop-Up utilities is that each 
one is immediately available by pressing 
a single key combination. On the down- 
side, more memory seems to be required 
for the .same combination of desktop ap- 
plications than with single-module pack- 
ages. and a lengthy .series of commands 
and options may have to be included in 
your AUTOEXEC.BAT file to get the 
whole system going. 

The on-screen look of the Pop-Ups is 
quite plain. Only a limited facility is 
available for changing the color, size, 
and location of the screen area used by 
the utilities and other forms of customi- 
zjjtion. The notepad, in particular, seems 
hampered by a slender, half-width screen 
display. But the lack of aesthetics in no 
way limits the usability of the programs. 
For instance, the calculators are among 
the best, with true "paper-trail" tape, 
and the financial calculator is unmatched 
in power among desktop utilities. Pop- 
Up DeskSet offers a powerful enhance- 
ment to any system. 

RESIDENT 

Resident is not a RAM-resident desktop 
utility package but a program that can 
make other applications RAM resident. 
It also includes one pop-up memory-resi- 
dent utility. Notepad, an elementary 
word processor that uses the PC's arrow 


6 




and function keys for control. 

Resident can make nearly any pro- 
gram memory resident, allowing you to 
freeze one program, skip to another to 
cany out a specific function, then pop 
back to the original exactly where you 
left off. It does not allow concurrent op- 
eration but does permit cutting and past- 
ing data between applications. Using 
Resident, you can turn your database into 
a pop-up telephone directory or your 
communications program into a tele- 
phone dialer. It may be particularly use- 
ful for a floppy-disk-based system, re- 
lieving the need to shuffle disks in and 
out of drives when shifting between ap- 
plications. 

Resident's primary obstacle is the limit- 
ed memory of most computers. Although 
the program requires only I2K bytes of 
overhead for each of its 26 applications 
(which can be made simultaneoasly mem- 
ory resident) plus 24K bytes of working 
RAM. memoiy disappears very quickly 
when you use Resident with the growing 
number of programs that require 384K 
bytes of RAM or more . 


SIDEKICK 

SideKick combines the most-used desk- 
top functions into a single memory-resi- 
dent package. Those functions include a 
calculator, a calendar and reminder sys- 
tem, notepad, auto-dialer, and an ASCII 
table. The calculator mimics a $9.95 
handheld model, the notepad copies 
much of WordStar, and the calendar fol- 
lows the Gregorian standard. The auto- 
dialer can pull numbers off the screen or 
look them up in a telephone directoiy. 
The interface and function keys are as 
consistent as po-ssible across its internal 
applications. All functions are accessible 
within other applications and can be se- 
lected with a moving-bar menu or Alt- 
key combinations. The first time a Side- 
Kiek function is accessed, the procedure 
takes two steps: one key press to get to 
the main menu, then another to choose 
the function you desire. Afterward, you 
can shift in and out of the same function 
with a single keystroke combination. 

Although all of SideKick's functions 
are incorporated into one module. Bor- 
land International supplies several ver- 


sions with various combinations of fea- 
tures. You need only load (and use 
memory for) the functions that you plan 
on using. 

One of the major strengths of Side- 
Kick is the versatility of its installation 
procedure. All important parameters of 
the program package can be modified 
(even the word processing control keys); 
windows can be enlarged, reduced, and 
moved; ports can be changed; and colors 
can be changed to suit your personal 
tastes. 

Borland International also sells a com- 
panion program. Traveling SideKick, 
which extends the abilities of the Side- 
Kick package to include features helpful 
to businessmen who are often on the 
road. The extension includes a vinyl 
binder for expense records and software 
to automate recordkeeping, as well as a 
report generator, special database con- 
version software so that appointments 
and addresses can be made instantly por- 
table. printed reference materials, and a 
handheld calculator the size of a credit 
card. — Winn L. Rosch 


M 

EBDlFACT FILE 


Homebase 
Amber Systems Inc. 

1 171 S. SaraU>gu-Sunnyvule Rd. 

San Jose. CA 95129 

(408)996-1883 

Usi Price; $69.95 

Requires: 256K RAM. two floppy 

disk drives or a hard disk. IX>S 2.0or 

later. 

In Short: A database-oriented set of 
desktop utilities that remain memory 
resident for instant access but require 
an overlay file. Features include data- 
base. THitcpad (editor), dialer, com- 
munications. calculator, screen sav- 
er. clix'k. and the ability to run DOS 
funetkins fnim within applications. 
Not c*opy pnxected. 

Cl^LE^QNnEADER~SEnviCECARO 


PC-Desk 

Software Studios Inc. 
8SI6Sugaii>ushO.. #104 
Annandale. VA 22003 
(703)978-23.39 


List Price: $49 until Sept. I : $79 
thereafter 

Requires: Memory needed depends 
on functions loaded. 

In Shorl: An integrated system con- 
sisting or'a 200-record databa.se. 
word processor with various print op- 
tions. calendar, timekeeping log. cal- 
culator. and auuxJialer. Does not pop 
up inside other af^lications. Not 
copy protected. 

ORCLE <28 ON HEADER SERVICE CARD 

Pop-Up DeskSet 
Popular Pmgrams Inc. 

1.35 Lake St.. #180 
Kirkland. WA 98033 
(800)447-6787 
(206) 822-7065 

List Price: $69.95 (with Plus option, 
$129.95) 

Requires: 64K RAM (more memory 
needed to load several nKxlules), any 
version of DOS. 

In Short: A set of memory-resident 


utility programs that cun be loaded 
and unloaded individually; each utili- 
ty can be accessed from within other 
applications. The series includes 
alarm eUxk. calendar, notepad, plain 
and financial calculators, dialer, 
communications system (optional), 
and the ability to execute DO.S func- 
tions fnim within applicatkms. Not 
a)py pnXcx'ted. 

ClRCLESarONREADCRSERVICECARO 


Resident 

Infonnaiion .Software Inc. 

26.39 Walnut Hill Une. #135 
Dallas. TX 75229 
(214) .35.3-2966 
List Price: $89.95 
Requires: 64K to 384K RAM. de- 
pending on pn>gram being made resi- 
dent. 

In Short; A utility that makes virtu- 
ally any applicatkm memory resident 
so that one pn)gr4m can be instantly 
stalled fmm within another. Includies 


a pop-up notepad program. Not a)py 
protected. 

CIRCLE 628 ON READER SERVlC^E CARD 

SideKick 

Borland International 
4585 Saitts Valley Dr. 

Scotts Valley. CA 95066 

(800)2.5.5-8008 

(408)4.38-8400 

List Price: $84.95 {Tnnrluifi Side- 
ATiVit. $69.9.5; both, $125) 

Requires: Memory needed depends 
on furKiions loaded. 

In Short: A set of desktop utilities 
including ruxepad, calculator, tele- 
phone dialer and directory, calendar 
and appointment b(H>k, and an ASCII 
l(x)k-up table that allows a great de- 
gree of installation freedom. Trawl- 
ing SideKick adds a binder, handheld 
calculator, printed reference materi- 
als. and conversion software. NiX 
copy pnxected. 

CIRCLE <2S ON READER ^PVCE CARO 


PC MAGAZINK ■ AUCiUST 1986 
359 


DATABASE SYSTEMS 


ASKTOrLTATE 

8479. 

dBsMllU 

BORLAND 

95. 

Reflex 

MICRORIU 

575. 

R^Bsse 5000 

NANTUCKET 

589. 

P/S^UOACK 

95. 

VP Into 

WORD PROCESSING 


DAC 

8 39. 

Es» Word 

UVING VIDEOTEXT 

59. 

Ready 

109. 

Think Tank 

MICROSOFT 

259. 

Word 

MICROPRO 

79. 


179. 

WordStar 3.3 

249. 

WordStar ProfentonaJ 

295. 

WordStar 20004- 
MULTTMATE 

89. 

Jutt Write 

229. 

Muttlmale 

245. 

Executive 

289. 

Advantage 

SSI (Satellite) 

89. 

The Library 

235. 

WordPerfect 4. 1 

SPREADSHEETS 


LOTUS 

8339. 

1-2-3 

MICROSOFT 

124. 

Multiptan 

PAPERBACK 

85. 

VP Planner 

INTEGRATED 

PACKAGES 


ASHTONTATE 

$415. 

Framework II 

LOTUS 

459. 

Symphony 

MICROSOFT 

«5. 

Windows 

SOFTWARE PUBLISHING 

75. 

Report 

84. 

File. Write. Graph. Acceu or Plan 
QUARIERDECK 

85. 

Desqview 

ACCOUNTING 


BPI 

8525. 

GL, AR, AP or Payroll 

DAC 

38. 

Easy Payroll 

55. 

Easy Accounting 

EVERGREEN 

185. 

One-Write-Plus 

STATE OF THE ART 

579. 

GU AR. AP. inv or Payroll 

PERSONAL FINANCE 


MECA 

8 85. 

Managing The Market 

109. 

Managing Your Money 
MONOGiUM 

109. 

Dollars A $ense 

SIMON A SCHUSTER 

55. 

J. K. Lasser Money Manager 
TIMEWORKS 

75. 

Ptfsonai Financial Planner 

CAD SYSTEMS 


AMERICAN SMALL BUSINESS 

8185. 

Pro Design 1 

FORGMGHT RESOURCES 

239. 

Draflx 1 

GENERIC SOFTWARE 

119. 

Generic CAD With Dot Ptot 

COMMUNICATIONS 


HAYES 

8 99. 

Smartcom II 

MICROSOFT 

188. 

Acceu 

MKROSTUF 

105. 

Crosstalk 

185. 

Transporter 

VM 

95. 

Relay 

149. 

R^y Gold 


Use Your Credit Card 

We’re your full line, full service 


UTIUTIES 

ALPHA SOFTWARE 
8 57. Keyworks 
AMBER 
40. Homebwe 
BORLAND 
40. Superkeyi 
55. Sidekick (copUble) 

CENTRAL roiNT 
25. Com II PC 
23. PC Tools 
81. PC Option Board 

FIFTH GENERATION 
105. Fastback 

FINOT GROUP 

04. Keep Track 

Fim 

39. Sideways 
NOR1W 

55. UtUities 
ROSESOFT 
83. Prokey 

PROGRAMMINO 

LANGUAGES 

■ORUND 
8 22. Turbo Tutor 

32. Turbo Todlbox 

35. Turbo GrapNx Toolbox 

33. Editor Toolbox 

40. Word Wizard 
40. Turbo Pascal 

40. Traveling Sidekkk 
49. Turbo New Pack 

05. Turbo Prolog 
05. Turbo Lightning 

79. Turbo Pascal w/8087 A BCD 
79. Traveling Sidekick Cwnbo 
155. Jumbo Pack 
MICROSOFT 
99. Macro Assembler 
199. Pascal Compiler 
275. C Compiler 
229. Fortran Compiler 

GRAPHICS 

DECISION RESOURCES 
8155. Sign Master 
209. Diagram Master 
235. Chanmaster 
245. Map Master 

GRAPHICS COMMUNICATION 
219. Freelance 
329. Graphwriter Combo 
MICROGRAFX 

115. Windows Draw (Req. Windows) 
229. PC Draw 
275. In-A-Vision 
MICROSOFT 
199. Chart 


• Business Accounts Program 

• Second Day Air Shipping 

• Toll Free Technical Support 


ORDERING INFORMATION 


• Most orders shipped second day air. 
Shipping Charges: 

• US & Puerto Rko — 3% ($6 minimum) 

• Canada — 12% ($15 minimum) 

• Foreign — 18% ($25 minimum) 

• APO, FPO — 6% ($10 minimum) 


• Large products may require 
additional shipping charges. 

• No additional charges for Visa. 
MasterCard. American Express. 

• Your credit card not charged 
until we ship. 


PRICES AND AVAILABILITY SUBJECT TO CHANOE WITHOUT NOTICE 


Conroy-LaPointe 

The IBM’ Compatible With 

*789 

640K, Dual 
Floppy Drives 

*979 

640K, Dual Floppy 
Drives, Graphics 
Card & Monitor 



LASER 128: 

Better than Apple* 
at half the 
price. 

*499 

With Monitor & Cable 




• 128K RAM. 32K ROM 

• 65C02 CPU 

• S'A" Floppy Drive, Internal 

• 1 Expansion Slot, Me 

« 1 Parallel & 2 Serial R)rts 


• External Drive Port 

• Numeric Keypad 

• 4 Cursor & 10 Function Keys 
a Supports Double Hi Res 

• Mouse/Joystick Port 


$Q^QWith Monitor, Printer, 

2ncl Floppy Drive, Cables 




MEMORY A 

MULTIFUNCTION 

BOARDS 


PC MASTERCARDT 

(1^99 KB $1 29 to 1.5 MB 

• Parallel Port 

384 KB $185 *Clock/Calendar 

• Game F^rt 

1 e UB * Utility Software 

MB 90 •! Year Umited Warranty 

ECONORAM^ 

384KB $109MVe:^,edW..»„.y 

•Full 3g4K Installed 


In Otngon 1.800.451-S151 
Hour* M Pacific 
Mon-Frt, 8.4 Sat 

P41 

Mall 1b: 

12060 SW OardMi Plac. 
Portland, OR 97223 


1 - 800 - 547-1289 

Business Accounts Call: 1-800-4-CONROY 




. . . No Extra Charge! 

discount computer source. 


• No Credit Card Surcharge 

• Conroy-LaPointe Credit Card 

• No Sales Tax — Anywhere! 

BUSINESS ACCOUNTS 

Not just for business, but for schools, government agencies, and other 
institutions. In addition to our regular low prices, wide selection and 
professional service, we now accept purchase orders from organizations 
who qualify. To receive an application, just call 1-800.4-CONROY (or 
503-6^7261 in Oregon). Orders shipped FOB shipping point. Call for 
full ordering information. 

XT/Model 2" 1 


MEMORY CHIPS & 
COPROCESSORS 

RAM CHIPS 

$ IS. 64K.200 NSKiU 
M. $4K. iSONSKiU 
S6. 2S6K KiU 
49. 128K KiU for AT 
HAUPPAGE 
119. 8067 Chip 
175. 8087-2 Chip 
229. 80287 pMt 5 (or AT 
549. 80287 Fast 8 (or AT 

EXPANSION BOARDS 

AST 

8225. SixPak Plus. 5S4K 
559. Rampage for PC 
599. SixPak fVemium 
495. Rampage for AT 
irn^L 

CALL Above Board 64K For PC 
CALL Above Board I28K for AT 
MAGNUM 

109. EcortoRAM 384K 
129. PC MasterCard No RAM 
185. PC MasterCard 384 K 
529. PC MasterCard I.S MB 
ORCHID 

279. Conquest No RAM 

taiItree 

269. JRAM 3. 2S6K EMS Board. PC 
279. JRAM AT3. No RAM (or AT 


More Standard Features 


• 640K RAM 

On Motherboard 

• Dual 360K 
Floppy Drives 

• Dual Speed 4.77 

& 8 MHz Processor 

• 135 Watt Power Supply 
•Selectric, PC/AT 

Style Keyboard 

• Parallel Printer Port 

• 2 Serial Ports 


• 5 Slots & Clock /Calendar 

• MS-DOS 2.11 

• Limited Warranty: 

1 Year F^rts, 90 Days Labor 

• FCC “B" Approval 

FREE 

SHIPPING 

on purchase of 
Conroy-LaPointe XT/Model 2 
to U.S. and Canada 


VIDEO BOARDS 

EVEREX 
$265. The Edge 
HERCULES 
159. Color Graphics 
519. Graphics Card 
ORCHID 
Turbo EGA 
QUAORAM 
Qua d EGA-f Board 
STB 

EGA Plus 
VIDEO 7 

Mono Graphics Adapter 


719. 

419. 


549. 

165. 


399. VEGA Board 

INPUT DEVICES A 
DIOITIZERS 


HnACHl 

$969. Tiger Tablet II (4 Buttons) 
ISYTRO^^ 

185. KB 5151 Keyboard 
519. KB 5153 Keyboard 
MICROSOFT 
129. Mouse 
139. Serial Mouse 

MOUSE SYSTEMS 

129. Mouse With Software A PC Paint 



XT/MARK 2" 


=^^SPER^Y PC/IT 

IBM® PC/AT 

Compatible 

$2599 


IBM PC/XT Compatible with 
Twice the Features, and Nearly 
Twice the Speed at Half the Price. 

$i94QS.ou., 

Roppy Drives, 
Graphics Card & Monitor 


•512K RAM Expandable to 5 MB 

• 6, 7.16, & 8 MHz Processor 

• 1 Parallel & 2 Serial Ports 

• 8 Expansion Slots 

• Clock/Calendar 

• Hard Disk Systems Available 

<2899 With Mono Card & Monitor 


DRIVES A 
TAPE BACKUPS 

CDC Floppy Drives 
$ 99. Kslf Height 360K 
119. Full Height 360K 
IRWIN 

559. 10 MB Tape Backup Kit 

SOJCCrn VALLEY COMPUTER 
599. Goldcard 21 MB Hard Disk Card 
SEAGATE Herd Drives 
479. 20 meg for PC. XT 
M9. 20 meg for AT 
599. 30 meg Half Hgt For PC. XT 
789. 30 meg for AT 
SYSG&I 

1085. 60 MB Internal Tape Backup 
1 150. W MB External Tape Backup 
1225. 20 MB Hard Disk. 20 MB Tape For PC 
1999. 30 MB Hard DUk. 60 MB Tape For AT 
TEAC Floppy Drives 
109. 55-BV Half Height 360K 
TOSHIBA 

1 IS. 360K FLoppy Drive For AT 
169. 1.2 MB Drive For AT 

MODEMS 

HAYES 

419. 1200 External 
379. 1200B internal 
629. 2400 External 
579. 2400B Internal 

CONROY-LAPOINTE 
185. I200B Internal w/Software 
195. 1200 External w/Software 
389. 2400 External w/Software 

PRINTERS A PLOTTERS 

CANON 

2199. Laser Printer A I -P 
EPSON 

389. FX 85 leOcps. 32 NLQ 
419. Hi 80 Plotter 
499. FX 266 200 cps. 40 NLQ 
649. LQ 800 180 cps. 60 LQ 
795. LQ 1000 180 cpi 60 IQ. IS" 

995. LQ 1500 200 cps, 67 LQ. 15" 
OKIDATA 

CALL 182 S or P. 192 S or P. 193. 292. 293 
PANASONIC 
275. P109I 120 cps. 

459. P3151 Daisywheel 
TOSHIBA 

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feels. When you warn to check the table, 
just type RUN 9000, and the table will dis- 
play without disturbing the rest of the code 
you have in memory. 

PRINTER CONTROLS The ability to 
control your printer with DOS alone is se- 
verely limited. The only real support DOS 
gives is the ability to change paper-width 
specifications and dump graphics to IBM 
control-code-compatible printers. Taking 
command of the host of features now 
packed into most printers thus requires ei- 
ther visiting BASIC and sending a bunch 
of esoteric CHR$ commands to the ma- 
chine. or shopping around for specialized 
(and expensive) .software that handles at 
least some of your printer's abilities. 

Everyone seems to have written a pro- 
gram to issue printer commands from the 


DOS prompt. Some are more confusing to 
use than the printer's escape sequences 
themselves. I've found that creating a sep- 
arate program for each major printer func- 
tion is the easiest technique, so I've made 
programs like DRAFT.COM, LETTER- 
COM, and ITAL1CS.COM that allow me 
to customize each print job. 

Writing several printer control pro- 
grams is not as much bother as it might at 
first seem. Every program that sends a 
command to the printer is pretty much the 
same except for the actual command codes 
that must be sent, so all printer control pro- 
grams can be built on the same founda- 
tion — a generic prototype program written 
in assembly language to be customized 
with the required code sequences. 

Such a prototype program can be creat- 
ed using DOS's DEBUG program, as 


DEBUG 
-N PP.COM 
-A 



XXXX 10100 

JHP 

160 

XXXX:0102 

DB 12,07^?? ; [Enter printer control code here in 
;hex characters# separating each with 
;a comma; end with PP; maximum 32 
jcharacters] 

XXXX: 01 05 

; [Enter a carriage return — the number at 

-A 122 

; 

left will vary] 

XXXX: 0122 

DB 

Form Peed sent to printer. $' ; [Enter text to 
;be sent to the screen here, ending 
;with a dollar sign ($) and enclosed 
;in single quotes; max. 62 characters] 

XXXX: 01 3D 

-A 160 


; [Enter a carriage return— the number at left 
;will vary] 

XXXX: 0160 

MOV 

AH#05 

XXXX: 016 2 

MOV 

BX,0102 

XXXX: 01 6 5 

MOV 

DL, [BX] 

XXXX: 0167 

CMP 

DL,FF 

XXXX: 016 A 

JZ 

0171 

XXXX:016C 

INT 

21 

XXXX:016E 

INC 

BX 

XXXX:016F 

JMP 

165 

XXXX:0171 

MOV 

DX,0122 

XXXX: 01 7 4 

MOV 

AH, 09 

XXXX: 0176 

INT 

21 

XXXX: 017 8 

INT 

20 

XXXX:017A 

-RCX 

CX 0000 

:7A 

-W 


; [Enter a carriage return] 

Writing 007A bytes 
-Q 


Figure 3: A primer control program you create with DEBUG . This one semis a form feed to the 
printer. Don’t type in the nine eharaeters and numbers I with colons in the middle) at the beginning 
of most lines; the PC provides these. End each line hy hitting the Enter key. if the beep annoys you, 
eiiminate the ‘ ‘07. “from the line reading “ 12,07, EF . ' ’ You don’t have la type in the eommems 
that appear after the semicolons. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
362 




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PRODUCTIVITY 

■ PC LAB NOTES 


shown in Figure 3, This program does two 
things: first it sends the appropriate com- 
mand sequence to the printer, then it prints 
out on the screen what it has done to con- 
firm your command. The control sequence 
can contain up to 32 hexadecimal control 
or text characters; the confirmation mes- 
sage, up to 62, You simply insert the ap- 
propriate codes or text in the space re- 
served in the program. 

The program requires that a final hexa- 
decimal FF character be added to each 
control sequence. This character is not sent 
to the printer but tells the program that the 
command is done and to ignore the balance 
of the 32 spaces reserved for control se- 
quence characters. Similarly, a dollar sign 
must end the text sequence to signal to 
DOS the end of the text. 

To use the DEBUG script, start the DE- 
BUG program by typing 

DEBUG 

followed by the full name of the program 
that you want to create, remembering that 
the filename extension must be .COM for 
a working program. For instance, for a 
program to send form feeds to the printer, 
called FF.COM, you would type 

DEBUG FF.COM 

DEBUG responds by telling you that the 
file does not already exist (if it does, you'll 
probably want to try again with another 
name. Type Q to exit DEBUG or use the N 


Common Epson FX-80 Control Codes 


Printer Function 

Code for On 

Off 

* Perf skip of 6 lines 

1B,4E,06 

1B,4F 

10 char page offset 

lB,6Cr0A 


Elite 

1B,4D 

IB, 50 

* Condensed 

0F 

12 

* LQ (emphasized) 

IB, 45 

IB, 46 

Double strike 

IB, 47 

IB, 48 

^Double width 

1B,57,1 

IB, 57,0 

Italics 

IB, 34 

IB, 35 

Reset 

IB, 40 


* Double space but 



hold page length 

IB, 41, 18, IB, 43 

,21 

* Indicates same code 

used for IBM Graphics Printer 


Rgure 4: Additional printer control codes. Use the codes given in the DEBUG program in Figure 
3 instead of the formfeed example shown . For instance, to make your printer skip six lines before 
and after each perforation, change the line reading ' 'I2,07,FF' ' in Figure 3 to 
"1B,4E,06,07,FF ' ' . Some commands can be used in conjunction with one another; others may 
cancel each other. Check your printer manual for compatibility between modes. The same 
technique, using different codes, works for non-Epson printers. 


command to set a new name). 

For the form feed program, the appro- 
priate control sequence would be 12,7,FF, 
The 1 2 is the form feed control code itself, 
the 7 makes the printer beep so you know 
the command got there okay, and the FF 
signals the end of the command. An appro- 
priate text string would be “Fonn Feed 
sent to printers”. 

After you’ve created one program, you 
can use it as the basis for customization. 
Merely use DEBUG to load your proto- 
type into memory, then use the N com- 
mand to rename it. Change the command 
sequence by typing A 102 followed by the 
command sequence, sending a blank line 
to end it, then A 1 22 to change the text se- 
quence. Finally, use the W command to 
write the finished file to disk. In 5 minutes 
you can create half a dozen printer control 
programs. (Some of the more common 
printer control codes to use with the pro- 
gram shown in Figure 3 for Epson or IBM 
printers are given in Figure 4. ) 

For another printer-setup utility, see 
SETUP.COM in Programming/Utilities, 
PC Magazine, Volume 5 Number 12, 
page 267. Both FF.COM described here 
and SETUP.COM can be downloaded 
from the PC Magazine Interactive Reader 
Service, (212) 6%-0360 (8 data bits, I 
stop bit, no parity). [i? 


Winn L, Rosch is a contributing editor of 
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PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 CIRCLE 375 ON READER SERVICE CARD 
365 


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PRODUCTIVITY 


I PROGRAMMINGAJTILITIES ■ CHARLES PETZOLD 


Exploring the 

EGA, PART 1 



In this first of tw’o installments you ’ ll learn what IBM should have told you about the EGA and 
get a set of utility programs for exploring its potential. 


I BM's introduction of the Enhanced 
Graphics Adapter (EGA) and En- 
hanced Color Display (ECD) in the fall 
of 1984 came with little warning, and as a 
result the rest of the industry has been slow 
to catch up with software support and com- 
patible hardware. Now, however, almost 
2 years later, the EGA has established it- 
self as the high-resolution color graphics 
standard for all but specialized applica- 
tions. 

Whether you're a veteran owner or re- 
cent purchaser of an EGA, you may have 
been disappointed that the documentation 
IBM supplies with the EGA board covers 
only installation. Most manufacturers of 
EGA compatibles don't do much better. 
Most EGAs do not come with demonstra- 
tion programs. Although the improved res- 
olution of the EGA is obvious to the eye. 
it’s certainly not clear what other magic is 
packed into the board. 

I’m going to show you some of this 
magic. One of my goals is to make the 
EGA a more familiar and friendly part of 
your system by untangling the confusion 
of video modes, resolutions, colors, 
pages, and fonts. The other is to provide 
you with a set of utilities you can use to tai- 
lor the EGA’s operations to your needs. 

With only a few exceptions, the pro- 
grams presented here use the BIOS Inter- 
rupt lOh video routines to communicate 
with the EGA. The techniques I’ll be dem- 
onstrating in the course of this article can 
be incorporated into programs written in 
high-level languages, however, since 
many of them (such as Turbo Pascal) also 
support BIOS calls. (BASIC, of course, is 


the most notable exception. ) 

To go beyond what I’ll present in this 
article and in Part II (next issue), you’ll 
have to get a copy of the EGA Technical 
Reference. At this writing, this is available 
only as an update to the two-volume IBM 
Options and Adapters Technical Refer- 
ence (IBM part number 6322509, $125). 
The article on the EGA in the April 1985 
issue of PC Tech Journal {Volame 3 Num- 
ber 4) also has a gtxxl description of the 
BIOS calls. 

CREATING THE UTILITIES The 

short programs presented here are written 
in aiisembly language. For most of them, 
however, you do not need to use the IBM 
or Microsoft Macro Assembler. Instead, 1 
have presented the programs in a script for- 
mat that allows you to create the execut- 
able .COM files using DEBUG (2.0 or lat- 
er). Here’s how to do it: 

First, type each listing into an ASCII 


■ Although the improved 
resolution of the EGA 
is obvious to the eye, 
it’s certainly not clear 
what other magic is 
packed into the board. 


file with the extension .SCR. You can cre- 
ate the ASCII file using EDLIN, Word- 
Star’s non-document mode, Microsoft 
Word (save unformatted), XyWrite, or any 
word processor that can create ASCII files. 
You’ll notice that each program listing has 
at least one blank line near the bottom. 
That blank line is very important, so make 
sure your .SCR file has a blank line in the 
same place. You do not have to type in the 
semicolons or anything to the right of the 
semicolons; these are comments and labels 
to help you undersuind what is going on in 
the program. 

Second, use DEBUG to create the exe- 
cutable .COM file with the command 

DEBUG < filename .SCK 

where filename is the name of the .SCR 
file. If you accidently omit the left angle 
bracket, enter Q to exit DEBUG and try 
again. When DEBUG creates the .COM 
file from the .SCR file, watch for error 
messages. An error message from DE- 
BUG indicates a mistake in your typing. 

As an alternative, you can skip the cre- 
ation of the .SCR file by just entering 

DEBUG 

and typing in the lines directly. 

If you have a Macro Assembler and 
some experience in assembly language 
programming, you may want to convert 
these SCR listings into .ASM programs. 
This will facilitate your own enhance- 
ments and experimention. To assist you in 
this. I've included jump and call labels in 
the comment section of the script listing. 
However, there are a number of other con- 


PC MAGAZINE 


AUGUST lt»6 


PRODUCTIVITY 


■ PROGRAMMING/UTILITIES 


Mode 

Type 

Display 

Resolution Chars 

Box 

Colors 

Pages 

0fcl 

Text 

CD 

200x320 

25x40 

8x8 

16 


8 



ECD 

350x320 

25x40 

14x8 

16/64 


8 

2l3 

Text 

CD 

200x640 

25x80 

8x8 

16 


8 



ECD 

350x640 

25x80 

14x6 

16/64 


8 

4(5 

Graph 

C04ECD 

200x320 

25x40 

8x8 

4 


1 

6 

Graph 

CD&ECD 

200x640 

25x80 

14x8 

2 


1 

7 

Text 

MONO 

350x720 

25x80 

14x9 

4 


8 

6,9,10 


PCjr 

modes not 

supported by EGA 



11«12 


Used internally by 

EGA for 

loading fonts - 



13 

Graph 

CD6ECD 

200x320 

25x40 

8x8 

16 


(64K} 









(12eK) 








8 

(256K) 

14 

Graph 

CDSECD 

209x640 

25x80 

8x8 

16 


(64K) 








2 

( 12 eK) 









(256K) 

15 

Graph 

MONO 

350x640 

25x80 

14x8 

4 


(64K) 








2 

(126K) 

16 

Graph 

ECD 

350x640 

25x80 

14x8 

4/64 (64X) 


(12eK) 







16/64 (128K) 

2 

(256R) 


Figure 1 : Tlw hXiA video iikhU's . Which video mmies you cun use and how they hH)k on your screen 
depends on the monitor uttuehed ut the EGA and the amt unit of memory on the adapter. 


siderations involved in convening the 
SCR Hie lo an ASM Ibnnal (such as us- 
ing SHORT jumps, specifying numbers 
with the H suffix for hexadecimal, substi- 
tuting labels for data references, etc. ). so I 
can recommend trying this only if you 
know what's going on. 

If you have a mixlem. of course, you 
can save yourself the trouble of having to 
enter the programs at the keyboard; you 
can download them without charge from 
PC' Mafsuzinc'fi Interactive Reader Ser- 
vice. (2I2) 6%-0.T6(). Use .T(X) or l.2(X) 
bps. X data bits. I stop bit. no parity. If 
your communications software supports 
the Xmodem protocol, you can download 
the .COM versions directly; if not, you can 
use a straight ASCII download to get the 
.SCR files and convert them into .COM 
fonnat with DEBUG, as outlined above. 

DISABU^G ANSLSYS If you have de- 
vice drivers or remain-resident programs 
that do things with the display, particularly 
with colors. 1 suggest that you first try out 
these EGA utilities without loading those 
other programs. You'll see later, for in- 
stance, that the EGA has alternative meth- 
ods for coloring your display. In particu- 
lar. you'll want tt) try out my utility 
programs without ANSI.SYS. ANSI. SYS 
always assumes that the display is 25 lines 
long, and in Part 2 of this article we'll he 
experimenting with some displays that arc 
not 25 lines long. ANSI.SYS also docs not 
correctly determine the starling address for 
different video pages. 

VIDEO MODES The Enhanced Graph- 
ics Adapter supports a variety of video 
modes, including all those supported by 
the original Color/Graphics Adapter 
(CGA) and the Monochrome Adapter. 
Additional EGA mixles provide higher- 
resolution graphics with more colors. 

Figure I shows all the video mrxies sup- 
ported by the EGA. The video modes 
available on your EGA depend upon the 
type of monitor attached and the amount of 
memory installed on the adapter board. 
The Re.solution column indicates the num- 
ber of displayabic scan lines (going down 
the screen) and the number of displayabic 
dots (going across the screen). 

The number of scan lines that the EGA 
displays is cither 2(X) (which is the same as 

)> C 


the CGA) or .550 (which is the same as the 
Monochrome Adapter). An EGA attached 
to a regular Color Display cannot use the 
.550-line mtxies. An EGA attached to an 
Enhanced Color Display (ECD) can u.se ei- 
ther 2(X) or .550 lines. The difference be- 
tween 2(X) and .550 scan lines is obvious on 
the screen: you can count the individual 
scan lines on your screen in a 200-line dis- 
play. but with .550 lines you cannot. We'll 


H ECAMODt.CON 


A ise 



JMP 

• IIB 

1 Skip Label 

DB 

‘Current video 

Mode Is 10$' 

MOV 

BX.B05O 


HOV 

Oil, BA 

1 Set D« to 10 

SUB 

AL,AL 

; Accunulate nunber 

NOV 

CX.BBBl 


HOV 

OL. (BXJ 

; CeTLUOPi 

SUB 

DL,3B 

1 Subtract *0* 

JB 

0150 

) JuBip if not nuaber 



1 See if over 9 

JA 

•130 

i Junp if not number 



t Multiply by 10 


AL.OL 

; Add to accumulation 


BX 


LOOP 

• 125 

I LOOP CETLOOP 


BX,'»5D 

> See if no parameter 



I JZ SRIPSET 

SUB 

AN. AH 


INT 


} through BIOS 



I SXIPSLT: 

INT 

10 

; Get video mode 

AND 

AX,a07F 

; Wipe out high bit 


DK 


ADD 

(0110) .AX 


HOV 

OX, 0102 

; Point to text 

HOV 

AH, 09 

; Write to icreen 



r through DOS 



> Terminate 

R CX 



57 

H 



0 




Figure 2; U.se DEHUG and this 
EGAMODE. .SCR file to create 
EGAMODE.COM. which you can u.se lo select 
an EGA video mode or display the c ■urreni 
mode. 


sec later that these two basic modes of op- 
eration are also very different in ways oth- 
er than resolution. 

If you have 25 lines of characters dis- 
played on your screen (which is normal but 
definitely not the only way you can use 
your EGA), the Box column in Figure 1 
shows the resolution available for each 
character. If you have an Enhanced Color 
Display (or compatible) attached to your 
EGA and you get only an 8 by 8 character 
bt)x, your EGA DIP switches arc not set 
correctly . 

The program EGAMODE shown in 
Figure 2 will let you switch to any video 
mtxle supported by your monitor. After 
you create EGAMODE.COM from EGA- 
MODE. SCR using DEBUG, you can run 
the program by typing 

EGAMODE mode 

where minle is the video mode (expre.ssed 
as a decimal number) to which you want to 
switch. The normal modes for the DOS 
command level and most programs that 
use text are 3 (for color displays) and 7 (for 
monochrome). You can run EGAMODE 
without a parameter to see what your cur- 
rent mode is. 

You can also use the PC-DOS MODE 
command to switch between video modes, 
but that command is limited to the text 
imxles and u.ses key words rather than 
numbers. The MODE parameters and the 


M A C) A /. I N 1; ■ A IJ Ci U S T 1 U K (i 
36* 


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CIRCLE 242 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



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PRODUCTIVITY 


■ PROGRAMMING/UTILITIES 


corresponding video modes are BW40 
(mode 0). COW) (mode I), BW80 (mode 
2), COSO (mixie 3). and MONO (mode 7). 
Modes 0 through 6 are the Color/Graphics 
Adapter modes. Mode 7 is the Mono- 
chrome Adapter mode. All of these modes 
are supported by the EGA when it is con- 
nected to the proper monitor. 

Modes 8, 9, and 10 are the additional 
PCyr graphics modes that are not supported 
by the EGA BIOS. Modes 1 1 and 12 are 
used internally by the EGA BIOS to load 
fonts into the adapter. 

You'll notice that the table begins with 
pairs of modes that are the same; 0 and 1 , 2 
and 3. 4 and 5. On the EGA both modes in 
each pair are identical, as they were identi- 
cal on the CGA if you used its regular, di- 
rect-drive connector. However, if you 
used the composite video output on the 
CGA with a black-and-white monitor, 
modes 0. 2. and 5 disabled the color-burst 
signal. The EGA does not support com- 
posite monitors. 

EXPERIMENTING If you experiment 
with EGAMODE, you may be surprised 
that the EGA BIOS allows you to change 
the mode to one that your monitor dtxisn't 
support. 1. too. was surprised at this. If you 
happen to accidently do it. close your eyes 
and enter EGAMODE 3 (for color) or 
EGAMODE 7 (for monochrome) to get 
things back to normal. 

You'll notice that you can switch to 
graphics modes at the DOS command lev- 
el. but the screen operations are signifi- 
cantly slower. This is because the BIOS 
has to construct the dot patterns of each 
character on the screen instead of just writ- 
ing the ASCII code of the character to dis- 
play memory. If you run an applications 
program that does not set the video mode 
but writes directly to the display, you’ll get 
garbage on your screen if you enter it in a 
graphics mode. 

Normally when the EGA switches to a 
new mode, it clears out all video memory. 
However, if you add 1 28 to the mode num- 
ber when running EGAMODE, the EGA 
BIOS will set the mode but will retain the 
contents of the screen memory buffer, so 
the screen will not be cleared. (The PCjr 
BIOS functions similarly.) However, the 
cursor will be returned to its home position 
in the upper-left-hand comer. If you're in 


mode 3. you should try entering 
EGAMODE 131 

to see what happens. The screen will still 
have all the contents, but the cursor will 
now be up at the top. For a more interest- 
ing effect, tty 

EGAMODE 144 

This sets the EGA to mode 16 without 
clearing memory. You'll have some 
snowy garbage scattered on your display. 
Those are the characters stored in the EGA 


■ You may be surprised 
that the EGA BIOS 
allows you to change 
the mode to one that 
your monitor doesn’t 
support. 

memory that are now being interpreted as 
dots. As you can see. the text and graphics 
modes are very different. Now go back to 
mode 3 with 

EGAMODE 131 

The characters from the graphics mode 
now appear as various colored blocks on 
the screen. 

I suggest you don't run other programs 
after resetting the mode with 1 28 added to 
it. When a program reads the mode 
through the BIOS, the BIOS reports this 
high-numbered mode. This may com- 
pletely confuse an applications program. 

I'll refer to the video modes by number 
throughout this article, so keep the chart 
shown in Figure 1 handy. Or better yet. 
memorize it. (Don't worry. I won't quiz 
you later. ) 

THEEGAANDOTHERADAPTERS If 

you have your EGA connected to a color 
monitor, you can still have a Monochrome 
Adapter in your system as well. Similarly, 
if your E(3A is connected to a mono- 
chrome display, you can also have a Co- 


lor/Graphics Adapter in your system. 
EGAMODE will not switch between the 
two adapters, however. Use the PC-DOS 
MODE command to do that, 

if you have a Hercules Graphics Card 
attached to a monochrome monitor, it too 
can coexist with an EGA attached to a col- 
or display. However, you'll want to use 
EGAMODE before running any program 
that uses the “page I " graphics of the Her- 
cules card. Here's why: Monochrome 
mode 7 uses memory starting at segment 
address BOOOh for the display. Color 
modes 0 through 6 use memory starting at 
segment address B8C)0h. No eonflict so 
far. However, the Hercules card can use 
both "page 0” (starting at BOOOh) and 
“page 1" (at B8(X)h) for graphics. Many 
programs that support the Hercules card 
use “page I” graphics. You may know 
about this because some of these programs 
require that you run HGC FULL before 
you use them to enable this second graph- 
ics page. 

Hercules “page 1” graphics would 
normally conflict with a CGA (and hence 
an EGA) board. However, the EGA 
graphics modes 13 through 16 all use dis- 
play memory beginning at AOOOh. This al- 
lows you to move the EGA out of the way 
before you use Hercules graphics. To do 
this, you would enter 

MODE CO80 
EGAMODE 16 
MODE MONO 

The first program switches to the EGA in 
mode 3 (in case you're not already there); 
the second sets the EGA mode to 16 
(which uses segment A(X)0h); and the third 
program switches to the monochrome dis- 
play. (If your EGA is attached to a regular 
Color Display, use EGAMODE 14 in- 
stead.) Now you can use Hercules graph- 
ics without any restrictions. If you have 
some batch files with HGC FULL state- 
ments, you can add these three lines to the 
batch file before the HGC FULL line. 

After you're done and want to return to 
the EGA, use 

MODE CO80 

This statement can be placed after an HGC 
HALF statement in a batch file. 

You won't need to do this for all pro- 
grams that use Hercules graphics. But if 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
372 


Cornerstone has always 
been user-friendly. 

a a Cornerstone may well change the popular notions about h m ^ 

■ ■ database software... —New York Times gg 

The terms ‘powerful’ and ‘easy-to-use’ are pressed into 
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Cornerstone is the best program I have used. I found no 


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99 


Now it’s 

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Cornerstone is the only relational database system designed specifically for non-programmers. 

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*1986 Infocom. Inc. 
Comemone is a trademark of Infocom. Inc. 
All remaining products mentioned are 
trademarks nr registered trademarks, as indKatrd. 


CIRCLE 207 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PRODUCTIVITY 


■ PROGRAMMING/UTILITIES 


you ever see garbage appear on a color dis- 
play attached to an EGA while graphics 
appear on a monochrome display attached 
to a Hercules Graphics Card, that means 
there’s a memory conflict. 

PAGES AND PAGES The chart in Fig- 
ure I has a column called Pages that shows 
the number of video pages on the EGA for 
various modes and memory sizes. Particu- 
larly in character modes, the display you 
see on your screen takes up only a small 
amount of the total EGA metrKMy . The ex- 
tra memory is used for other video pages. 

The EGAPAGE program, shown in 
Figure 3, lets you change the video page 
from the DOS command level. The BIOS 
keeps track of cursor positions for eight 
separate video pages. When a video mode 
is first set, all of the cursors are set to the 
upper-left-hand comer. To switch to page 
I , execute 

EGAPAGE 1 

To go back to page 0, execute 

EGAPAGE 0 

The EGAPAGE program doesn’t accept 
page numbers higher than 7, but it also 
doesn’t check to see whether the current 
video mode supports less than 8 pages. 
Without a parameter, EGAPAGE tells you 
the current video page. 

EGAPAGE is useful when you have 
something on your screen that you want to 
return to later. Just change the video page, 
do your other tasks, and then come back to 
the original video page. Resetting the vid- 
eo mode, however, blanks out the contents 
of all video pages. 

(ANSI. SYS users, take note: The EGA 
uses different starting addresses than the 
CGA for these video pages. Although the 
starting address is stored in the BIOS data 
area, ANSI. SYS doesn’t use it and will not 
correctly handle anything other than page 
Don the EGA.) 

For a while I experimented with a resi- 
dent program that changed video pages 
from the keyboard, the idea being that you 
could do something on the DOS command 
level on page 1 , switch to page 0, go into 
your word processor, and then look at 
what was on the page I screen. In use, 
however, this program became very con- 
fusing, since it often looked as if I had been 


M ECAPAGS.OOH 


A 



JHP 

•llA 

t Jap BBCIH 

se 

"Curitnt Vidao 

Pag* 1* ••■ 

MOV 

ALrtBtSD] 

1 BBGlHt Convert 

SUB 

AL,3« 

1 Paraaetcc 

JB 

•129 

j JC OETPACB 

CMP 

Al.,97 

t S*« If *t>ov* 7 

JA 

•129 

t JA CBTPAGB 

NOV 

AH, as 


INT 


1 through BIOS 


AH, BP 

1 GBTPAGBt 

INT 

11 

1 through BIOS 

ADD 

[•1181 .BH 

} Stor* in *tring 

MOV 

DX,B1B2 


MOV 

AH, 89 

1 And display it 

INT 

2B 

1 TarBinat* 

R CX 



3A 



N 



Q 




Figure 3: EGAPAGE.COM lets you change the 
video page from the DOS command level. 


magically transported back to the DOS 
command level, although I was still in my 
word processor. 

THE 64-COLOR PALETTE For the 

350-line modes, you’ll notice I’ve indicat- 
ed the available colors in Figure I as 
16/64. This means that only 16 colors can 
be displayed simultaneously on the screen, 
but these 16 colors may he selected from 
64 colors. In the video modes that use 200 
scan lines, only 16 colors are possible. 

That 64 colors are available only on the 
ECD in 350-line modes is not a coinci- 
dence or the whimsy of the people who de- 
signed the EGA. The Enhanced Color Dis- 
play runs at a faster horizontal sync rate in 
order to fit in all 350 lines. The display is 
triggered to use this higher horizont^ sync 
rate by the polarity of the vertical sync sig- 
nal. At the same time, it uses six color sig- 
nals on the video connector instead of just 
the four that the regular Color Display 
uses. (The Monochrome Display uses two 
signals for color: Video and Intensity.) 

The 4-bit color code in 200-line modes 
is called IRGB. The RGB part of this 
stands for Red, Green, and Blue, and I 
stands for Intensity. Thus, 16 colors are 
available: low- and high-intensity versions 
of 8 colors. 

The 6-bit color code in 350-line modes 
can be represented as “rgbRGB” with 
both primary (RGB) and secondary (rgb) 
red, green, and blue signals. The lower- 
case letters are sometimes referred to as 
“'/3 intensity" (which are darker) and the 
uppercase letters are intensity" 
(brighter). In both cases, these are digital 


signals, either on or off, so the 350-line 
modes have a total of 64 colors. 

CGA COLOR To understand how color 
works on the EGA and what we can do 
with color, let’s first review what we know 
about color on the CGA: 

In CGA text modes, each character 
stored in the adapter memory has a corre- 
sponding 1-byte “attribute” that controls 
the foreground and background colors of 
the character. The lower 4 bits of this attri- 
bute contain an IRGB code for the fore- 
ground color, which is the color of the 
character. 

The next highest 3 bits of the attribute 
contain an RGB code (nonintensified) for 
the background color. The highest bit con- 
trols blinking. 

In this respect, the EGA works the same 
way and uses the same attribute codes as 
the CGA. 

(On the CGA, you could disable blink- 
ing, and thus make the higher 4 bits a full 
IRGB code for the background, by writing 
the value 09h to register 3D8h. The EGA 
does not support this register, but you can 
do the same thing with a BIOS call: 

MOV AX, 1003h 

MOV BL. 0 

INT 10h 

This enables background intensity. A val- 
ue of I in BL enables blinking.) 

The big difference between the (TGA 
and the EGA in handling color is this: On 
the CGA, the 4 color bits represented by 
the IRGB code go directly to the video 
connector and then the monitor. On the 
EGA, the 4-bit color code passes through 
an “Attribute Controller” before going 
out to the monitor. In 2(X)-line modes, this 
Attribute Controller can translate a 4-bit 
IRGB code into any other 4-bit IRGB 
code. In 350-line modes, the Attribute 
Controller can translate it into any 6-bit 
rgbRGB code. The Attribute Controller 
functions as a lookup array. The transla- 
tion is controlled by values loaded into the 
EGA “palette registers.” 

Figure 4 shows the default mapping of 
the IRGB codes into rgbRGB codes in the 
EGA 350-line itKxles. The binary repre- 
sentation is helpful because it shows how 
the bits correspond directly to the letters in 
“IRGB” or “rgbRGB.” The octal (base 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
374 


$ 2000 ? 

That's Too Darned High! 


Why should a CAD package cost more than a Word 
Processor? It shouldn’t! Lots of people ask how we can 
offer a CAD system as good as ProDesign M at a price as 
low as $299. It's easy. A PC Software Package does not 
cost $2000 to manufacture. It doesn't even cost $200. It 
makes us ask the questions, "Why do comparable CAD 
packages cost $2000 and more?" "What makes a CAD 
package cost more than a Word Processor? " 

ProDesign II doesn't. ProDesign II is the complete 
CAD package you get for $299. With ProDesign II, you 
get such advanced features as Auto Dimensioning, Area 
Fill, Fillets. Mirroring. Isometrics, Curve Fitting, Object 
Snap, Attributes. Drawing Merge, and many, many more. 
Features once available only for $2000 or more. Features 
you get at no extra charge with ProDesign II. 

But there is another, very important reason you 
should get ProDesign II. ProDesign II is very unique 
among CAD packages. It is easy to learn and use. When 
we call ProDesign II "The Easy To Use CAD System", 
we're not joking. You will be productive with ProDesign 1 1 
in an hour or two instead of a week or two. 

What else does ProDesign II offer? Compatibility. 
Compatibility with over 100 printers. Compatibility with 


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display adapters. Compatibility with any software that can 
produce HP plotter commands. Compatibility with main- 
frame CAD systems (IGES). All at no extra charge! (You 
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What additional hardware do you need? None! An 
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ProDesign II produces high resolution drawings on your 
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IBM/Epson compatible printer. And you don't have to get 
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ProDesign II — Affordable, Compatible, and Usable! 

Where do you get it? See your local dealer or contact: 

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918/825-4844 


PRODESIGN II — ONLY $299! 



ORCLE 475 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



PRODUCTIVITY 


■ PROGRAMMING/UTILITIES 



IRGB 

code 


Default 

rgbRGB mapping 

Color 

binary 

octal 

hex 

binary 

octal 

hex 

Black 

0000 

00 

00 

000000 

00 

00 

Blue 

0001 

01 

00 

000001 

01 

01 

Green 

0010 

02 

02 

000010 

02 

02 

Cyan 

0011 

03 

03 

000011 

03 

03 

Red 

0100 

04 

04 

000100 

04 

04 

Magenta 

0101 

05 

05 

000101 

05 

05 

Brown 

0110 

06 

06 

010100 

24 

14 

White 

0111 

07 

07 

000111 

07 

07 

Dark Grey 

1000 

10 

06 

111000 

70 

38 

Light Blue 

1001 

11 

09 

111001 

71 

39 

Light Green 

1010 

12 

0A 

111010 

72 

3A 

Light ^an 

1011 

13 

0B 

111011 

73 

3B 

Light Red 

1100 

14 

0C 

111100 

74 

3C 

Light Magenta 

1101 

15 

0D 

111101 

75 

3D 

Yellow 

1110 

16 

0E 

111110 

76 

3E 

Bright White 

1111 

17 

0P 

111111 

77 

3F 


Figure 4: The CGA-compaiihle 4-hit iRGB color code is mopped to a 6-bit r^bRGB color cttde on 
the Enhanced Graphics Adapter. 


8) represenlation for the rgbRGB code is 
actually more useful because the first digit 
represents the '/i-intensity rgb signal and 
the second digit is the %-intensity RGB 
signal . (To those readers who have only re- 
cently been mastering hexadecimal. I 
apologize for dragging in octal at this 
point.) 

Note that for the intensified colors, the 
default mapping combines the %-intensity 
signal with all three '/i-intensity signals so 
that, at the bottom of the chart in Figure 4. 
the “bright white" color has all bits turned 
on. Note also that the EGA brown is faked; 
it uses a dark green and light red signal. 
Forty-eight other possible rgbRGB codes 
aren't used at all in this default mapping. 

On the DOS command level, and in 
many programs that don't use color, char- 
acters are represented with an attribute 
code of 07h (hexadecimal). This means 
the background is black (0) and the fore- 
ground is white (7). However, the EGA 
maps these two codes into black and white 
only by default. We can change the map- 
ping to whatever we want by loading dif- 
ferent values into the EGA palette regis- 
ters. 

That’s what EGACOLOR (shown in 
Figure 5) does. It takes two arguments, 
both of them octal numbers. The first two- 
digit number is the IRGB color value from 
0 through 17. The second is the rgbRGB 
color value from 00 through 77 that you 
want the IRGB code translated into. Lead- 
ing zeros are not required. 

For instance, executing 

EGACOLOR 00 01 

EGACOLOR 07 76 


H BGACOLOR.COM 


A 111 

NOV 

AX, [1150] 

) lit PAiANetec 

CALL 

111? 

I CALL CONVERT 

NOV 

BL,AL 

AX.IIICD] 

1 Save in BL 

MOV 

1 2nd Paranatat 

CALL 

111? 

1 CALL CONVERT 

MOV 

BB,AL 

1 Sava In BR 

NOV 

AX, 1111 

) Chan 9 a Palatta 


11 

1 through BIOS 

IXT 

21 

I TaiNlnate 

808 

AL,3I 

1 CONVERT 1 

CNP 

AH, 31 

t Check if one digit 

Jt 

112? 

1 JS ALLDOHB 

SUB 

AH, 31 

) Convert to binary 

NOV 

a, 13 

1 Three hit ehlft 

88 L 

AL.CL 


ADO 

AL.AH 

r Put two together 

RBT 


1 ALLOONEi 

R at 

38 

N 

0 




Figure 5: EGACOLOR.COM changes the 
default color tnappings by inattipttlating the 
EGA palette registers. 


changes everything normally displayed as 
black to dark blue, and everything normal- 
ly white to high-intensity yellow. If you're 
not using any other program to control col- 
or and run these two programs, your 
screen will suddenly burst into yellow-on- 
blue colors. The color translation is done 
in the EGA hardware. 

If you have your EGA connected to a 
regular Color Display (which supports 
only 200 scan lines and 1 6 colors), you can 
still u.se EGACOLOR but only with the 4- 
bit IRGB codes in octal (i.e.. 00 through 
17) for the second argument. 

If you change the video mode with 
EGAMODE, the colors go back to nor- 
mal. A mode reset always loads up the 
EGA palette registers with the default 
mapping. The best thing about using the 
EGA palette registers to control color is 
that programs that do not reset the video 
mode will still use the colors you've set. 
Later on. we’ll see how to get the palette 
registers loaded even for programs that set 
the video mode. 

By running EGACOLOR 64 times with 
the command 

EGACOLOR 0 XX 

where XX is an octal number from 00 
through 77, you can see all 64 colors as 
background colors. But don’t wa.ste your 
time. There’s a better method. 

THE EGA’S 64 VARIETIES As I men- 
tioned previously, you can’t display all 64 
colors at once on the EGA. It’s just impos- 
sible. But with a little “gonzo program- 


ming," even the impossible is possible, so 
let’s do it anyway. 

The EGAPALET program shown in 
Figure 6 displays all 64 EGA eolors on an 
Enhanced Color Display. If you have a PC 
AT, substitute a value of 2B for 22 in the 
line near the top that begins with DB. 

When you run the program, you should 
have eight rows with eight different colors 
in each. The display is much more stable 
on an AT; the flickering and wavy lines be- 
tween the rows of color on a PC or XT is 
normal. If the bottom row is larger than the 
rest on your machine, increase that number 
following DB a bit. If the bottom row is 
smaller than the rest (or if you don’t see 
rows at all), decrease the number. Make it 
no bigger than 2Bh. 

You may have to turn up your contrast 
and brightness controls to see the full range 
of colors. Even then, some of the colors 


■ The EGA brown is 
faked. It uses a dark 
green and light red 
signal. 

may appear very similar. If you have a 
magnifying glass or camera close-up lens, 
you can check that they do indeed use dif- 
ferent dots. Press any key to leave the pro- 
gram. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
376 



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CIRCLE 233 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




PRODUCTIVITY 


■ PROGRAMMING/UTILITIES 


The EGAPALET program actually 
uses only eight color values, 0 through 7, 
and displays eight columns of blocks using 
these v^ues. However, every '/48oof a sec- 
ond, EGAPALET changes these eight pal- 
ette registers, so the colors on your screen 
change. It controls the timing by counting 
horizontal scan retraces. 

The default EGA color mapping uses 
the top row and bottom row of EGAPA- 
LET’s 64 colors, except for brown, which 
is in the third row , fifth from the left. If you 
see a color you'd like to use in EGACO- 



Rgure 6: EGAPALET. COM displays all 64 
colors on an Enhanced Color Display. 

Increase the value after DB for machines faster 
than a slock PC. 

LOR, you can determine its octal code in 
this way; Count down to the row from the 
top, starting at zero. That's the fust digit. 
Count over to the column from the left, 
starting at zero. That's the second digit. 
Didn't I say octal was better for colors? 


M tCABOflO.OM 


A IM 

NOV 

AXrJMSOl 

1 G«t Paruvtvc 

SUB 

AL.il 

r Convtxt to bliwry 

CMP 

AH, 31 

) Cbock for blank 

Jt 

• 113 

i JS ALLOONI 

SUB 

AH. 31 

f Convact 3nd Slglt 

NOV 

CL, 13 

t Shttt it 3 apacaa 

SSL 

AL,CL 


ADD 

AL,AH 

t Stick two tesothar 

NOV 

BH.AL 

t AUDONBi 

NOV 

AX.lMl 

t Sat botdat thiouQb 

riTP 

11 

) BIOS 

INT 

21 

1 Tacalnata 

R Cl 

XC 

M 

Q 




Figure 7: EGABORD.COM changes the 
border color on an EGA , but you may not like 
the results. 


THE EGA BORDER PROBLEM In 

350-line modes the EGA also allows you 
to set the border (called the ‘ ‘overscan reg- 
ister") to any of the 64 colors. Figure 7 
shows a program to do this. You tun it by 
typing 

EGABORD XX 

where XX is the two-digit octal code for an 
rgbRGB color. 

But in case you haven't already heard, 
let me warn you: the results are pathetic. 
Not only is the border very skimpy, but us- 
ing it causes some shading problems in the 
left two-thirds of the display. (If your EGA 
is attached to a regular Color Display, you 
don't have this problem. But again, in that 


case you can set your border to only 1 of 
the 16 IRGB colors.) 

Borders on the EGA are a problem, and 
the best way to solve the problem is to con- 
vince yourself that an EGA cannot display 
borders in 350-line modes. When you 
know something is impossible, it may 
cease to bother you. After a while, you 
may even prefer the black border. So let's 
go through some display arithmetic to 
prove it. Then you can relax knowing 
you're not missing out on anything. 

In 200-line compatibility modes, the 
EGA (like the CGA) uses the 14.318-MHz 
clock available on the system bus for the 
dot clock. At each pulse of the dot clock, 
the adapter sends a color signal to the dis- 
play. But, in 350-line enhanced modes, 
the EGA has to write more dots to the dis- 
play in the same amount of time, so the 
EGA uses an on-board 16.257-MHz crys- 
tal for the dot clock. 

This already looks ominous: the EGA 
displays 75 percent more scan lines with 
only a 13.5 percent higher dot clock fre- 
quency. 

In 200-line compatibility modes, the 
horizontal scan rate is 15.75 kHz. This is 
the rate at which each scan line of the 
screen is displayed. Dividing the dot clock 
frequency! 14.318 MHz) by the horizontal 
scan rate results in 909 dots, the equivalent 


N EGATIME.COM 

A laa 

JMP eiA3 

DW 61100, 5602, 2083, 5604, sees, sees ,6Eie,2Bll,6ElS,lA16 
DW 5F00, 5502, 3F03, 5504, 5B05,8C06,6E10,2B11,6E15,1A16 
DH 5E00, 5402, 3E03, 5404, 5AB5,BC06,6E10,2B11,6E15,1A16 
DW SDO0, 5302,3003 , 5304, 5905, 8C06,6E10,2B11,6E15,1A16 
DW 5C00, 5302, 3C03, 5304, 5805, SC0e,6E10,2Bll,6E15,lA16 
DW 5F00, 5502, 3F03, 5504, 5B05,7C06, 6610, 2811,6615, 1216 
DM 5000, 5302, 3003,5304, 5905,7006,6610, 2811,6615, 1216 
OW 5800,5302, 3703, 5104, 5BB5,6C06,5E10,2B11,5E15,0A16 


MOV 

AL, I005D] 

; Get parameter 

AND 

ALf07 

; Use lowest 7 bits 

MOV 

AH, 14 

; Multiply by 20 

NUL 

AH 


ADD 

AX, 0103 

; Add offset of beginning 

MOV 

SI, AX 

j Make that the source 

MOV 

DX,03O4 

; CRT Controller Register 

MOV 

CX,000A 

; 10 words to load 

CLD 



LOD&i 


; OUTLOOP: Get byte 

OUT 

DX,AX 

; Output to register 

LOOP 

01BB 

t Loop OUTLOOP 

INT 

20 

f Terminate 

R CX 



BE 




W 

Q 


Figure 8: EGATIME.COM lets you adjust timing values on the EGA to allow a proper-size border 
to be displayed. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
378 


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P R O I) U C T I V ] T Y 


■ PROGRAMMING/UTILITIES 


of 1 14 characters. The displayabic area 
uses only 640 dots for 80 characters. The 
horizontal retrace requires about 8 charac- 
ters. The 26 characters left over are in the 
border area. If you divide the horizontal 
.scan rate (15.75 kHz) by the vertical scan 
rate (60 Hz), you get 262 lines. The dis- 
playabic area needs only 200 lines (25- 
character rows with 8 scan lines each). 
Again, some of the leftovers occur during 
the vertical retrace (when the signal jumps 
from the lower-right-hand to the upper- 
left-hand comers of the display), but the 
rest ate available for the top and bottom 
border region. 

In .550-line modes on the Enhanced 
Color Display, both the dot clock frequen- 
cy and the horizontal scan rate ate slightly 
higher. The 16.257-MHz dot clock fre- 
quency divided by the 2 1 .85-kHz horizon- 
tal scan rate results in 744 dots or 93 char- 
acters. of which 80 are displayed and about 
10 occur during the horizontal retrace. 
That leaves about 3 characters for the left 
and right borders. The horizontal scan rate 
(21.8.5 kHz) divided by the vertical scan 
rate (60 Hz) shows that the EGA can dis- 
play 364 lines: 350 of them ate used in the 
display and 1 3 of them occur during the 
vertical retrace. That leaves about I scan 
line for a top and bottom border. 

The tea.son the EGA can’t do borders in 
350-line modes is thus very simple: Very 
soon after it finishes a scan line, it begins 
the horizontal retrace. Almost immediate- 
ly after completing the la,st scan line, it 
makes a vertical retrace. The border area is 
untouched by the dot gun. 

In fact, because of the very tight timing 
re.striclions. the display is not fully blanked 
during the whole horizontal retrace. That’s 
why you gel a faint background shading 
when you try to display a border. The un- 
wanted shading is actually the border color 
being displayed during the horizontal re- 
trace. It’s faint because it’s stretched out. 

Now that you know a border is impossi- 
ble in 35()-line modes, you can skip the 
next section. 

NOW FOR A REAL BORDER Sooner 
or later, you are going to read about a way 
to do a real border on the EGA. so you 
might as well read about it here. Opinion is 
divided over whether this technique can 
damage your monitor. Enough said’.’ You 


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Rgure 9: EGABORDR.COM is a resident 
proftram to change border colors using All-f 
and Alt'! . 


don’t realty want a border, do you? 

OK, OK. so you do. Here’s the pre- 
mise: Although the Enhanced Color Dis- 
play is designed for a horizontal sync rate 
of 2 1, 85 kHz. it has some tolerances. Most 
ECDs can mn about 5 percent lower. If we 
program the EGA to do so, we’ll be able to 
fit in enough dots to make a border, 

(Although the Enhanced Color Display 
normally runs at a vertical sync rate of 60 
Hz. it is actually rated for vertical syncs be- 
tween 50 Hz and 60 Hz. Thus, getting a 
lop and bottom border is fairly easy. It’s 
the left and right borders that cause the 
problem.) 

The EGATIME program shown in Fig- 
ure 8 is designed to be run in mode 3 with 
an Enhanced Color Display attached, but it 
does not check to make sure you are in 
compliance with these requirements. It 
takes a one-digit parameter from 0 to 7 to 
select from 8 sets of possible values to load 
into the EGA’s CR’T Controller registers. 
The.se change the basic timings of the 
EGA. The lower the number you give to 
EGATIME, the better the bolder but the 
less chance your ECD can handle it. The 
parameter of 7 loads the normal values. 

You can experiment with EGATIME 
by first running 


EGABORD 1 

to select a blue border. Then ny 

EGATIME 6 

and if that doesn’t make your screen look 
like a television that needs servicing, try 
something lower. You can always get back 
to normal with 

EGATIME 7 

If you really want a border, using EGA- 
TIME to get it is up to you. If you decide to 
use it, you may also want to add EGA- 
BORDR (listed in Figure 9) to your AU- 
TOEXEC.BAT file. This is a remain-resi- 
dent program that lets you change your 
border to any of the 64 colors from your 
keyboard. Alt-] advances through the 64 
colors, and Alt-] goes backward. 

PERMANENT COLOR MAPPING 

The EGACOLOR program maps attribute 
colors into screen colors, but these color 
mappings revert to the defaults whenever a 
program changes the video mode. I’m sure 
some readers are already thinking about 
writing a resident program that would in- 
tercept Interrupt lOh, watch for a mode 
change, and then set the colors you want 
right after the BIOS has changed the video 
mode. 

Stop. There’s a better way to do it. 

When the BIOS resets the video mode, 
it loads the EGA registers and sets the val- 


■ Sooner or later, you 
will read about a way 
to do a real border on 
the EGA. 


ues in the BIOS data area based on a set of 
“video parameters” that include the de- 
fault colors. ’These video parameters are 
normally located in the EGA BIOS. How- 
ever, you can direct the BIOS to use an al- 
ternative set of video parameters by creat- 
ing a remain-resident program with the 
parameters and setting a pointer located in 
the BIOS data area to point to it. This may 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
380 



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PRODUCTIVITY 

■ PROGRAMMING/UTILITIES 


sound tricky but it’s not: the EGA BIOS is 
set up to allow you to do things like this le- 
gitimately and easily 

On page 107 of the BIOS listing in the 
EGA Technical Reference, you’ll see a 
pointer called SAVE_PTR stored at mem- 
ory location 0000:04A8. It points to a set 
of seven other double-word (i.e., segment 
and offset) pointers, called DWORD_l 
through DWORD_7. DWORD_5 through 
DWORD_7 are reserved for future use. 

DWORD_l points to a 1472-byte loca- 
tion in memory that contains 64 video pa- 
rameters for each of the 23 video modes 
supported by the EGA. Twenty-three? 
Where did 23 video modes come from? 
First, there are 17 video modes, 0 through 
16, that are the same as those in Figure 1 . 
Although the EGA does not support modes 
8 through 10 (the PQr modes) and uses 
modes 1 1 and 12 internally when loading 
fonts, these are still included in the table. 
But modes 0 through 3 at the begiiming of 
this table are for the 200-scan-line versions 
when a regular Color Display is attached to 
the EGA. Modes 15 and 16 are for EGAs 
with only 64K of memory. So, after these 
17 modes, the table next contains values 
for modes ISand 16when I28Kormoreis 
attached to the EGA. Finally, 350-scan- 
line versions of modes 0 through 3 are in- 
cluded when an EGA is equipped with an 
Enhanced Color Display. That makes 23. 

(Note: Although page 103 of the EGA 
Technical Reference indicates in large let- 
ters that the Interrupt 43h vector points to 
the Video Parameters table, this is not so. 
Interrupt 43h actually points to the Graph- 
ics Character Table, which is the font used 
to construct characters in graphics modes. 
Interrupt 44h, which the EGA Technical 
Reference mistakenly indicates as pointing 
to this Graphics Character Table, is not 
used by the EGA BIOS. This change may 
seem odd since Interrupt 44h is used by the 
PCjr to point to the Graphics Character Ta- 
ble, but that’s the way it is.) 

For each video mode, the 64 video pa- 
rameters include the values loaded into the 
palette registers. But if we tried to change 
the table directly, it wouldn’t work since 
they are stored in the EGA ROM BIOS, 
and we can’t write into ROM. 

So, first let’s create a remain-resident 
program called EGAPRMOV (which 
stands for “EGA Parameter Move”) that 


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Figure 10: EGAPRMOV.COM moves video 
parameters and pointers to an area in RAM 
where they can be modified by other programs , 


simply moves the set of seven pointers and 
the entire video parameter table into RAM . 
This program is shown in Figure 10. It 
need be executed only once during your 
PC session. 

Now we can manipulate the video pa- 
rameters. Figure 1 1 shows a program 
called EGACOSET (“EGA Color Set") 
that replaces the default palette values for 
video mode 3 (in 350-line mode) with 
those of your own choosing. The two lines 
with the 16 hexadecimal numbers are 
yours to customize. For instaiKe, if you 
use 


DB II, II, 12, 03, 14, 05, 06, 3E 
DB 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 32 



Figure 1 1 : EGACOSET.COM sets the mode 3 
video parameters for customized palette 
register values. Modify the DB lines for the 
color mappings you want. 


the EGA will map color 00 (black) to 01 
(blue), color 07 (white) will be mapped to 
3E (bright yellow), and color OF (bright 
white) will be mapped to 32 (bright green). 

If your EGA is attached to a regular 
Color Display, change the line reading 
ADD DI,05A3 to ADD DI,00E3 and use 
only color values that range from 00 
through IF in the DB lines. 

When you first execute EGACOSET, 
nothing will happen. But if you then 
change the video mode with an 

EGAHODE 3 

your screen will display yellow-on-blue. 

Once EGACOSET is executed, the 
EGA BIOS will load these values into the 
palette registers whenever mode 3 is set. 
When a program tries to display a white- 
on-black character, yellow-on-blue will 
show up instead. EGACOSET is not resi- 
dent like EGAPRMOV, so you can ex- 
periment by mnning different versions of it 
without using additional memory. 

If you put both EGAPRMOV and 
EGACOSET in your AUTOEXEC.BAT 
file, almost every program that uses black- 
and-white in video mode 3 will use your 
customized color scheme instead. It’s as 
simple as that. 

There are exceptions, however. Some 
“EGA-aware” programs load the palette 
registers themselves after they load. Such 
programs include Microsoft Word 2.0 and 
the new EGA drivers for 1-2-3, Release 
lA. BASICA 3.2 loads OK but then 
changes the palette registers back to nor- 
mal on exit. 

If you’ve also found an EGATIME set- 
ting that works for you. Figure 12 shows a 
program called EGABOSET that will also 
adjust the CRT Controller registers to 
these values when nuxle 3 is set. EGABO- 
SET assumes that EGAPRMOV has been 
loaded. It’s set up for the same values as 
EGATIME 0 and a blue border. If EGA- 
TIME 0 didn’t work but something else 
did, count down the lines of numbers be- 
ginning with DW in EGATIME. SCR 
(starting at 0) and substitute the number in 
the line beginning with DW in EGABO- 
SET.SCR. If you want a border color other 
than blue, ch^ge the number after the line 
that begins DB in EGABOSET to the 
hexadecimal rgbRGB code for the border 
color you want. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
382 


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■ PROGRAMMING 



Figure 12; ECABOSET adjusts video 
parameters so that EGA timings for mode 3 
allow a border coior on a mode reset. 


Again, for people with a regular Color 
Display attached to an EGA: Do not use 
EGABOSET. If you want a bonier color 
set automatically, go back to EGACO- 
SET. Change the line reading MOV 


■ Part 2 of this article 
will cover creating your 
own fonts and loading 
them into the EGA. 


CX.OOIO to MOV CX,(X)I2. At the end of 
the second line of numbers that start with 
DB, add a comma, 08, another comma, 
and the color value of the border you want. 
The line after R CX should be changed 
from 2B to 2D. 

THERE’SSTOJLMORE Part2of“Ex- 
ploring the EGA,” in the next issue of PC 
Magazine, will cover creating your own 
fonts, loading them into the EGA, using a 
SI 2-character set, and switching to the 3S- 
and 43-line modes. In addition to giving 
you an introduction to EGA graphics, I’U 
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including a 1 20-column display. ISl 


Charles Petzold is a contributing editor of 
PC Magazine. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
384 


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PRODUCTIVITY 


■ JARED TAYLOR 


Spreadsheet 


CLINIC 


Here’s a group of handy 1-2-3 macros and tips, including a novel use of@NA, a warning 

beep to signal when a macro shouldn’t be run, and a fumigatorfor a Release 2.0 bug. 



A 

B 

C 

11 

COST 

C3 

/rncCOST-C3- 

12 

FORECAST 

G52..H5e 

/rncFORECAST~G52 . . H56“ 

13 

LOOP 

Q43 

/rncLOOP’'Q43“ 

14 

REVENUE 

B43. .E46 

/rncREVENUE~B43 . . E46- 

15 

TOTAL 

E23 

/rncTOTAL~E23~ 


Formula in cell Cll: 

+ -/rnc"&All&''-"S,Bll&"~- 


Figure 1 : A technique for reinstalling range names from a file that has been translated from 1 -2-3. 
Release 2.0, into lA. 


TRANSLATION BUG IN 1-20, 
RELEASE 2.0 

Release 2.0 of 1-2-3 has a utility that trans- 
lates worksheets to different file formats. 
You would use it when you wanted to 
translate a 2.0 file into a format that is to be 
run under I A. Obviously, there are some 
formulas that are legal in 2.0 but illegal in 
lA. and these will produce a “Formula 
translation error" message. You have to 
go through the new file and fix them so 
they will work in lA. 

However, there are some copies of 2.0 
in which the translation utility gives you 
the same error message even when the for- 
mulas are perfectly valid in lA. What 
causes the error message is the existence of 
named ranges in the original 2.0 file. For 
some reason the translation utility can’t 
handle them. The translation will work if 
you delete the named ranges with the 
/Range Name Reset command, but then 
your model may not work right. 

I have found an easy way to build a 
macro to reinstall the ranges and their 
names in the copy translated into I A. First, 
make a backup copy of the 2.0 file you 
want to translate and then use the /Range 
Name Table command to build a table. 
You'll get something like columns A and 
B only of Figure I . Next put the formula 

in cell Cl I and copy it down column C. 
Your range table will now look very much 
like the table in Figure I . Use the /Range 
Value command on column C to turn the 
formulas into values. Both the source 
range and destination range should be all 


the data in the column. Next, delete all the 
range names in the 2.0 file with /Range 
Name Reset and use the translation utility 
to translate the file. 

Once the translation is finished, read 
the new .WKS file into t-2-3. Release 1 A. 
If you give the top of column C a macro 
range name and tun the macro, all the 
ranges will properly reinstall. 

Ulysses C. Wang 
Urbana. Illinois 

Fortunately, the later copies of 2.0 have 
corrected this bug. If you do run into it. an- 
other way to reinstall range names in the 
I A file is to use the macro in Figure 2. Be 
sure to give the cells to the right the names 


\T 

/c-R-NAME- (right) 
/o-ADDRESS- 


/rnc 

R-NAME 


ADDRESS 

" {down} {lef t}/xg\T“ 


Figure 2: An alternative macro for reinstalling 
range names. 


on their left. Put the cursor on the first 
name in the range table and hit Alt-T. 


ANOTHERUSE EORtaNA 

Most spreadsheets have an @NA func- 
tion. which is used as a temporary place 
holder for missing or ‘ 'not available" data. 
You need this because spreadsheets usual- 
ly treat blank cells like zeros, and there ate 
times when zero and “not available” 
aren’t the same thing. For example, the av- 
erage of a list of numbers will be different 
if one number is zero, as opposed to not 
being there at all. @NA also serves as a re- 
minder to go back to that cell and enter 
data, since all formulas that refer to it will 
also display NA. 

There are times, though, when I use 
@NA differently. I intentionally put it into 
a cell to cause the results I want . Figure 3 is 
a good example of this. There are five fac- 
tors to consider in a compound-interest 
problem: present value, interest rate, num- 
ber of years, number of compounding pe- 
riods per year, and future value. Given any 
four of these five factors, you can solve for 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
387 


PRODUCTIVITY 


■ SPREADSHEET CLINIC 



C D 

E 

F 

3 

*** COMPOUND INTEREST *** 

Entry 

Calculated 

5 

Present Value $ $10 

000.00 

NA 

6 

Nominal Annual Interest % 

12.5 

NA 

7 

Compounded times/year 

2 

— 

8 

Number of Years n 

6 

NA 

9 

Future Value $ 

NA 

$20,698.90 

10 




Formulas in 'Calculated” column: 



P5: 

(E6/E7/100+1) “ (-E7*E8) *E9 



F6: 

((E9/E5)*(1/E7/E8)-1)*E7*100 



F7: 

— 



F8: 

gLN (E9/E5 ) / eLN( E6/E7/100+1 ) /E7 



F9: 

( E6/E7/1 0 0+1 ) ■ ( E7 *E8 ) *E5 



^gure 3: An interesting use for the (aNA function. 


the fifth. (The only exception to this rule is 
the number of compounding periods per 
year. You can’t express that as a simple 
equation but must solve for it by trial and 
error. However, you usually know the 
number of compounding peritxls and al- 
most never have to solve for it . ) 

In Figure 3 the data goes into column E 
and the answers appear in column F. To 
solve for future value, put the known data 
in cells E5 through E8. In cell E9 you put 
(<( NA and, if column F contains the right 
formulas, you get the answer in cell F^. 
Similarly, to solve for the interest rate, put 
the (q NA in F6 and the known data in the 
rest of column E. 

The reason this system works is that 
each formula in the answers column uses 
every cell from the entry column except 
the one it is solving for. The formula for 
future value in F9 uses values in cells E5 
through E8, but not in E9. However, all 
the other formulas in column F use E9. 
Thus, when E9 is "not available," you gel 
NA in every cell but the one that displays 
the answer you want. 

Martin Goebel 

Wedgewood Park, Newfoundland 

Canada 

This is an amusing use of ^‘NA. (u NA 
doesn’t cause the calculation you want to 
happen — rather, you're using it to sup- 
press the ones you don't want. If in Figure 
J there were a number instead of (p NA in 
cell E9, you would still get the right an- 
swer in cell F9. But you’d also get a dis- 
tracting hunch of irrelevant answers in 
cells F5,F6. and F8. 


1-2 J MENUS FOR FLOPPY DISKS 

I’ve devised a very simple menu system 
that helps me keep track of several hundred 
1-2-3 files on about 30 disks. Figure 4 con- 
tains an example of the kind of AU- 
TOI23.WKS file that I keep on every 
disk. It contains a one-line description of 
the files on that disk and the simplest possi- 
ble autoexeculing macro: /fr 

Now when I load 1-2-3, it lists the files 
on disk by reading in AUT0123. By exe- 
cuting the /fr command, it also displays the 
file names in the control panel. To retrieve 
a file, I just move the cursor to the file- 
name and hit Enter. Obviously, I have to 
update the menu when I add or erase files. 

Jerry Anderson 

Cincinnati, Ohio 


CONTROLLING AUTOEXEC MACROS 

In the Spreadsheet Clinic of March 25, 
1986 (PC Magazine. Volume 5 Number 
6), there was an interesting submission on 
writing autoexec macros that would mn 
only on certain days — once a week, once 


every 2 weeks, etc. In your editorial com- 
ments you wrote that you couldn’t think of 
a way to make the autoexec macro mn only 
at the end of every month. If you put the 
following line at the beginning of your \0 
macro, it will mn only on the last day of the 
month: 

\0 /xi§day ( §today+l) <>l“/xq 
. . . Macro 
Continues . . . 

Alan Tiet 

Los Angeles, California 

Quite so. I got several letters with end-of- 
month solutions, but Mr. Tiet's was the 
tightest line of code. 


SPEEDING UP MACROS 

Depending on their complexity, some 
1-2-3 macros can lake a long time to exe- 
cute. One way to speed them up is to turn 
off automatic recalculation with /wgrm as 
the first line of your macro. End your mac- 
ro with {calc}, or /wgra{calc} if you want 
the spreadsheet in auto recalc mode. The 
result is only one worksheet recalculation 
during the entire macro. This will save 
time when the macro contains commands, 
such as /Copy and /Move, that normally 
force an automatic recalculation. 

There are some macro operations that 
require recalculation in order to arrive at 
correct results, however, so be sure to put 
in {calc}s where they are necessary. 

Ralph Sappe 

Poughkeepsie, New York 

And one of the advantages of Release 2.0, 
of course, is that you can include a limited 
[recalc] command that recalculates only 
part of a large spreadsheet. 


A 


B C 

1 

SALENORT- 

Sales by District 

2 

SALESOUT- 

Sales District 

3 

SALEEAST- 

Sales by District 

4 

SALEWEST- 

Sales District 

S 

ROR 

Rate of Return for uneven cash flows. 

6 

yiELDS84- 

Database for 1984 Calendar Year yields 

7 

YlELDSeS- 

Database for 1985 Calendar Year yields 

8 

FLOWCHAR- 

For generating simple box and line flowcharts. 

9 

TENYEAR - 

Ten year volume and profit summary. 

11 



12 



13 

\0 

/fr 


Figure 4: A menu and auioe.tec macro for AUTO 123. WKS. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
388 


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■ SPREADSHEET CLINIC 


MACROS THAT WARN YOU IF THEY 
SHOULDNTBERUN 

You may sometimes find that some 1-2-3 
macros should be run only if certain condi- 
tions are met. To give but one example, a 
macro that does a lot of data manipulation 
can cause trouble if you haven’t entered 


\s /j(lAl<5'/yyyyy/»q 

nacco continues . . 

. . if all is well. 


Rgure 5: A macro that will run only under 
certain conditions and will beep to warn you if 
those conditions are not met. 


the data before you run it. 

The single line of macro code shown in 
Figure 5 is a good way to start macros that 
should be run only under certain condi- 
tions. In this specific case the test condi- 
tion is very simple — the macro will not run 
if A I is less than five — but you can make 
the overall criterion as complex as neces- 


sary. If the test condition is not met, the 
macro beeps five times to warn you, then 
quits. (Y is an illegal choice after the slash 
command, so you will get as many beeps 
as you have Ys.) 

Russell Baetke 
Seattle, Washington 


■ This macro, which 
beeps if a test condition is 
not met, will also send the 
cursor to a block of text 
that explains why the 
macro didn’t run. 


If you want to give the user a little more 
help, you might change the line of code to 
this: 

/xiAl<5“/yyyyy (esc) {gotolMESSAGE'/xq 

This macro will beep if the test condition is 
not met, but it will also send the cursor to a 
cell named MESSAGE. This would be the 
beginning of a block of text that explains 
why the macro didn’t run and what you 
should do about it. 


CONTRIBUTE TO THE CLINIC 

Share your latest spreadsheet discovery 
through PC Magazine's Spreadsheet Clin- 
ic. We’ll pay you $50 for anything we 
print , p/r<i an extra $25 if you submit it on a 
disk. If you send a disk, please include a 
printout of your submission. 

Mail your contributions to Spreadsheet 
Clinic, PC Magazine, One Park Avenue, 
New York, NY 10016. CH 


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CIRCLE 297 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




PRODUCTIVITY 


■ EDITED BY CRAIG L. STARK 


Power user tZl 

Tips on getting perfect envelopes from WordPerfect, patrolling the border in WordStar, and 
speeding up file tranters and setting colors in Crosstalk. 


1) cttl-Pl0 env <Return> 

2) Alt-F4 

3) Down-Arrow Down-Arrow Down-Arrow Down-Arrow 

4) Ctrl-F4 2 

5) <Boine> <Home> Op-Arrow 

6) Ctrl-<Return> 

7) Left-Arrow 

8) Shift-F8 3 55 <Return> 95 <Return> 

9) Shift Fl 6 10 <Return> 

10) Ctrl-F4 5 

11) Shift-F7 2 

12) <Hoine> <Home> Up- Arrow 

13) Ctrl-<Pg Down> y <Delete> 

14) Crtl-Fl0 


Figure 1 ; A macro to create an envelope-addressingformat in WordPerfect. 


ENVELOPING WORDPERFECT 

Typing envelopes to go with letters is a 
bothersome chore. WordPerfect 4.1 
malces it easier than most word processors 
do by providing a type-through (typewriter 
emulation) mode, but an even better meth- 
od is to use a macro that automatically 
copies the address to the envelope. 

To create the macro ENV in WordPer- 
fect 4.1, type the listing in Figure I . Step I 
starts the macro definition. Steps 2, 3, and 
4 define a four-line address block and copy 
it to the buffer. Steps 5, 6, and 7 move to 
the top of the document, create a new first 
page, and move the cursor to it. Step 8 sets 
the margins for the address area of the en- 
velope. I use a left margin of 35 and a right 
margin of 95, but this will vary on your 
printer. 

Step 9 inserts blank lines on the enve- 
lope. I use ten lines, but this also is printer- 
dependent. 

Steps 10 and 1 1 put the address on the 
new page and print the new page. 

Steps 1 2 and 1 3 go to the top of the doc- 
ument and delete the entire envelope page. 

Step 14 ends the macro definition. To 
use the macro: 

( 1 ) Put an envelope in the printer. 

(2) Position the cursor at the beginning 
of the address in the letter. 

(3) Type Alt-FIOenv <Retum>. 

If you use envelopes without a preprint- 
ed return address, you could add your own 
return address between steps 7 and 8 of the 
macro, adjusting the number of blank lines 
in step 9 to compensate for the added lines . 

Michael D. Nugent, Ph.D. 

Auburn, Washington 


A neat trick, and one that can be modified 
to work with almost any word processor. 
The key here is to copy the address block to 
another page and add the appropriate for- 
mat commands for the envelope. Using a 
WordPerfect macro helps automate the 
task, but you can do much the same thing 
without macros, or you can add macros by 
using memory-resident programs like Pro- 
Key or its equivalent. 

With WordPerfect, you can print the 
envelope, then erase the address you've 
just printed from the document immediate- 
ly. With programs like WordStar, which 
insist that you save the file before printing, 
you’ll want to add a "display message” 
and ' 'print pause’ ’ command if available. 
The message should remind you to pul an 
envelope or paper into the printer, as ap- 
propriate. The print-pause commcmd will 
then interrupt the print routine until you 
can load cm envelope into the printer be- 
fore you restart printing. 

■ — M. David Stone 


BORDER WARS 

A recent PC Magazine Power User col- 
umn contained a patch to change the bor- 
der color while using WordStar. However, 
the border stays the new color even after 
you leave WordStar. For those of us who 
use one screen color for WordStar and an- 
other for EXDS, this is a problem. I’ve de- 
vised a small WordStar patch that will 
change the border color when leaving 
WordStar. 

At location &H2A7, WordStar pro- 
vides a place to jump to a user-installed 
routine just before exiting the program. So 
all we have to do is install a separate copy 
of the border-setting routine at that ad- 
dress. If you’ve installed the border-setting 
WordStar patch, here’s how to add a rou- 
tine that will reset the border color to the 
default black when you quit WordStar and 
return to DOS: 

Make a copy of WordStar's WS.COM 
file, put it on the same disk with DEBUG 
.COM, then get into EXDS and type DE- 


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P R O D U C T I V I T Y 

a POWER USER 


BUG WS.COM. At the DEBUG prompt, 
type 

D 330 33F 

and hit Enter. Hopefully, you will see a 
row of all zeros. (If not, try the same thing 
starting at 270. typing D 270 27F. If you 
see a row of zeros, use 270 in place of the 
two 3.10s below). 

Next, type 

U 2A7 2A9 

and hit Enter. You will see one of two 
things. If no previous exit routine has been 
installed, you will see 

xxxx:02A7 NOP 

xxxx:02A8 NOP 

xxxx ■ 02A9 RET 

You may. however, see a jump instmc- 
tion, such as 

xxxx;02A7 JMP 034B 

The address that follows the JMP may 
vary. The jump shown here is installed by 
the WSCOLOR.BAS program that comes 
with WordSuir and jumps to a routine that 
clears the screen uprrn exit. Make a note of 
which of the two results you get. and, if 
there is a JMP instmction, record the num- 
ber jumped to. 

Now we are ready for the patch itself. 
Type everything below, hitting Enter at the 
end of each line, including the two blank 
lines. If you got the first result (no jump in- 
struction), then type the patch as shown ex- 
cepi for the parentheses and what's be- 
tween them. If you saw a JMP instruction, 
then on the line after INT 10. replace the 
RET with JMP nnnn. substituting the 
number you recorded for nnnn. 

A 2A7 
JMP 330 

A 330 

MOV BX,0000 
MOV AH.B 
INT 10 

RET (or JMP nnnn) 

W 

Q 

When you run WordStar, the border 
should now turn back to black upon exit to 
DOS. If you want a different color, then 

C MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 198 
-196 


substitute a different number for the last 
two digits of the 0000 above. For example, 
0003 will turn the border light blue, 0004 
to red, 000 1 to dark blue . 

Matthew Meighan 

Carbondale, Illinois 

It's probably a good idea to reset every- 
thing when you're done, hut are you sure 
you need a different color for DOS and 
WordStar/ DOS looks a»ful in the default 
gray-on-black. It's .simple to cu.stomize the 
colors in DOS and WordStar; we’ ve puh- 


m For those of us who use 
one screen color for 
WordStar and another for 
DOS, here’s a small 
WordStar patch that will 
change the border color 
when leaving WordStar. 

lished several color-setting methods in 
User-to-User and Power User. You can 
u.se the WordStar border patcher we pub- 
lished to set colors in both WordStar and 
DOS . — Paul Somerson 


SPEEDING FILE TRANSFERS 

Crosstalk XVI has a block size parameter 
(BKSIZE) that sets the size of the data 
block used during Crosstalk's proprietary- 
protocol file transfers. The larger the block 
size, the less often Cros.stalk adds error- 
checking information, and the less error- 
checking “overhead” is involved. 

On most phone lines occasional errors 
arc likely, so a small block size minimizes 
the amount of information that has to be re- 
sent. But on connections where errors are 
rare — such as when two computers are 
connected by an RS-232 cable or when 
you are using modems with dedicated lines 
or ones that have their own built-in error- 
checking protocols — a larger block size 
speeds up file transfer. 

According to its Version 3.5 manual. 

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OURNA 


8ZC67 



■ POWER USER 


PRODUCTIVITY 


Crosstalk allows a maximum block size 
setting of 10. If you use the help command 
for information on BKSIZE, however, the 
help screen says you can use a maximum 
block size of 16, And if you try entering a 
block size of, say, 45, the program gives 
the error message that BKSIZE must be 
between I and 40. This last message is cor- 
rect: Crosstalk 3.5 works just fine with a 
BKSIZE of 40. 

Version 3 .6 of Crosstalk uses the same 
numbers in the manual, the help screen, 
and the error message, but it will accept 

■ Crosstalk will not save 
color settings to the ,XTK 
file if you use its S Ave 
command. So you must 
use your favorite text 
editor to insert the 
commands manually. 

block sizes all the way up to 255 without 
problems. 

Name and address withheld 

With Version 3.6 you must be careful when 
changing block size. If you enter 256, 
Crosstalk will respond that the block size 
must be between I and 40, but if you enter 
a very large number, the program does 
strange things. Entering BK 800 on my 
copy of Version 3.6 sets the block size to 
32, and entering BK 635 sets the block size 
to 123. 

Another problem with using a targe 
block size is that Crosstalk can run out of 
memory and not realize it. / ran into this 
problem white running tests with 9600-bps 
modems, using a BKSIZE setting of 255 
and a large RAMdisk. Crosstalk ran out of 
working memory but didn’t warn me about 
it. The result was a fde that seemed to 
transfer without errors but wound up with 
large chunks of FF hex in the middle of the 
text. The problem disappeared when / 
made the RAMdisk smaller, freeing up 


more working memory for Crosstalk to 
use. The moral here is to remember to dou- 
ble-check what you’ re doing, since Cross- 
talk seems to get confused easily. 

— M. David Stone 


CROSSTALK COLOR REVISITED 

Richard Forand's letter and John Dickin- 
son's reply in Power User concerning 
Crosstalk XVI color screens (PC Maga- 
zine. Volume 4 Number 22) were correct 
as far as they went. However, for good re- 
sults a script file is not the place to put 
screen commands. Color com- 
mands — three of them — should be includ- 
ed in the command (.XTK) file. And even 
then there’s a Urck to it. 

Forand’s letter stated that to customize 
color in Crosstalk, you could enter the 
command by typing 

SC a fb 

where "SC is the abbreviation for the 
Screen command, a specifies which of 
Crosstalk's screen characters to change,/ 
specifies the foreground color, and b spec- 
ifies the background color.” [See the letter 
following for a listing of character and col- 
or codes. — Ed.] 

Unfortunately, Crosstalk will not save 
these color settings to the .XTK file if you 
use its SAve command. So you must use 
your favorite text editor to insert the com- 
mands manually, each on a line of its own. 

Then comes the trick. The three SCreen 
commands won’t all work if they’re con- 
secutive or even located close to each other 
in the .XTK file. In a typical 86-line file. 
I’ve found that they work with Crosstalk 
3.5 if the display is set up with one SCreen 
command on line 1 1, another on line 40, 
and a third on line 85, When the colors are 
loaded as part of the file, they stay set — 
including the status line color — until I ei- 
ther change them or return to DOS. 

My favorite display is set up with these 
three commands; 

SC N Cb (at line 11) 

SC H Yr (at line 40) 

SC L Yr (at line 85) 

This gives me a blue background with 
cyan text, a yellow-on-red command line, 
and highlighted characters. 

A warning; Once you’ve entered the 
screen commands in an .XTK file, do not 


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PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1985 CtRCLE 303 ON READER SERVtCE CARD 
399 


PRODUCTIVITY 




■ POWER USER 


screen 

N 

C 

screen 

H 

N 

screen 

L 

Wb 


Figure 2: Vw li.slinujor COLOR. XTS. tin 
XTAIJC .script file iliul » ill sel niirimil 
cluiracters In hrinlii cyiiii on ii hliick 
hack^riniiid. hif;hlif;hleil cliimiclers to bright 
nuifieillil on it block iHickfiroiiiid. iiinl 
coniinoiul line to bright while on a blue 
backgrotiiul. This file con Ih’ e.xeciifetl ol the 
"Coniinoiul? " prompt, ii.siiig the commond: 
DO COLOR. XJS<Knter> . 

use the SAve command to make subse- 
quent changes in that file. Use a text editor 
instead. If you use Cro.s.\tttlk's SAve com- 
mand. you will lose the screen commands 
from the file. 

Arthur Merc icr 
Union City. Connecticut 

Here are some additions to Richard For- 
and's letter and your comments. 


( I ) Red is also an available screen col- 
or. The cixJe is R or r. The complete 
Crosstalk character type and color letter 
ctxles are as follows: 

Valid Character Type Cixles 
N — Normal characters 
H — Highlighted characters 
L — Command-line characters 


Valid Color Ctxles 
K— Black 
B— Blue 
G — Green 
C — Cyan 


M — Magenta 
Y— Yellow 
R— Red 
W— White 


NOTE: Uppercase for bright, lower- 
ca.se for normal 


(3) When color customization com- 
mands are written into the command files, 
the status line color will stay set. Changes 
that Crosstalk makes to give information 
about the capture buffer will temporarily 
replace the status line eustom colors, but 
the custom colors will return when the 
buffer’s status is rc.sct. 

R. Leonard Gibson 
Cambridge. Massachusetts 

I’m a heavy user of Crosstalk. Version 
3.5. and have never experienced any prob- 
lem with the color on the command line re- 
maining set. 1 use the command 

screen L Hb 


(2) Forand notes that "color ctxles en- 
tered in lowercase appear normally, and 
those entered in uppercase are displayed in 
high intensity . ' ' Tliis applies to foreground 
colors only. Using uppercase for back- 
ground colors will cause blinking displays. 


for a bright white foreground on a blue 
background. If 1 use the .same command 
with an uppercase B for background, the 
command line will blink. This will happen 
when any background color is set to 
"bright" on the command line. 


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"At $795 STATPRO™ 2.0 (DOS) is 
the best statistical analysis program 
ever created for the IBM PC /XT/ AT" 

What makes Statpro so good? "There is really no magic about it - it is merely the result of a 
seven year development effort, and continual improvements based on end-user 
comments," says the eminent team of professionals who worked on Statpro. 


Statpro is generally regarded as the 
best statistical analysis software 
program on the market today. 
Indeed, the November 5, 1985 issue 
of PC Week surveyed a large 
number of statistical software 
programs and Statpro was the 
winner in terms of being the most 
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issue of Business Software, a 
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in terms of ease-of-use, practicality, 
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Reviewers Nationwide Also Vote 
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Harry I. FoxweU, Chairman 
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"STATPRO can be used by the 
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Shawn Biyan 

Business Computer Systems 
"Business by tne Numbers 
Statpro— A Powerful Statistical 
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Statpro 2.0 the successor product 
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1. STATPRO 2.0 interrelates 3 dif- 
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2. STATPRO 2.0 is incredibly fast 
due to DOS compatibility and the 



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3. STATPRCj 2.0 is, quite simply, the 
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4. Statpro 2.0 offers you a fuU 
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CIRCLE 121 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



PRODUCTIVITY 


■ POWER USER 


Another, similar problem crops up with 
the screen command when using VT-lOO 
emulation. If Crosstalk has normal charac- 
ters set to a bright color (using an upper- 
case color code, as in “Screen N C”), any 
inverse video operations coming from the 
host will blink. This yields a guaranteed 
headache for any screen-intensive applica- 
tions, but the fix is easy. Just use the “nor- 
mal” color attribute (“SCreen N c“) in- 
stead of the “bright" color. 

The screen command can be added to 
any Crosstalk configuration file (*.XTK) 
to provide default colors, but the user must 
enter these commands with an ASCII edi- 
tor, since Crosstalk's SAve command will 
not save these colors to the file. An alterna- 
tive is to create a script file containing the 
screen commands (see Figure 2), and ex- 
ecute it from the command line or a previ- 
ously assigned function key. 

Bill Woolf 

Silver Spring, Maryland 


While two of these three letters refer spe- 
cifically to Crosstalk, Version 3.5. after 
e.xperimenting with Versions 3 .5 and 3.6, / 
found that all the comments apply to both . 

Messrs. Mercier and Woolf obviously 
disagree about the best way to set colors, 
but for the record, both methods work. The 
advantage of Mercier’ s approach is that 
Crosstalk wakes up with the colors you 
want. The advantage of Woolf s approach 
is that you can use Crosstalk's SAve com- 
mand without losing the color sellings in 
the. XTK file. 

Another advantage of Woolf s proce- 
dure is that you can store several sets of 
colors in different script files and minimize 
eyestrain by changing colors during long 
on-line sessions. And if you run into the 
blinking problem during VT-lOO emula- 
tion. you can likewise change colors 
quickly and easily. 

The blinking problem during VT-IOO em- 
ulation is the one comment I was not able to 


Is there an 

XEDIT 

compatible editor for 
your IBM PC? 

Yes. KEDIT. 

• Most XEDIT coininatuis and 
features 

• XEDIT fullscreen lavoui 

• Multiple nies 

• Splitscreen editing 

• Redcfinable kevs 

• Enhanced block operations 

• DOS command interface 

• And much, much more 

XEDIT is IBM’s powerful fullscreen editor for VM/CMS 


CIRCLE 389 ON READER SERVICE CARD 

PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 19 
402 


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verijy, as / lacked a suitable host computer. 
The fix seems to rruike sense, though, andTd 
be surprised if it didn't work. 

It's also useful to know that if you acci- 
dentally set the display blinking by using 
an uppercase letter for the background 
color, you can turn off the blinking simply 
by giving another screen command. And 
both Mercier s and Woolf s suggested dis- 
play colors are worth a look. 

— M. David Stone 


SHARE YOUR POWER 
Tell the world about your latest technical 
tips for hardware and software applica- 
tions through Power User, and we’ll pay 
you $50 for your trouble , plus an extra $25 
if you submit it on a disk. If you do send a 
disk, please include a printout of your sub- 
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sit. Mail your contributions to Power User. 
PC Magazine y One Park Ave. , New York, 
NY 10016. 



Please write to; 

PC Magazine, 

Box 2445, Boulder, 
CO 80322. Include 
your mailing label 
from a recent issue 
of PC Magazine for 
faster service. 

Please allow up to 
60 days for change 
of address to take 
place. 

I h 

6 


A secret weapon 
for 1-2-3 and Symphony users. 



The Cambridge Spreadsheet Analyst can win you 
the battle against spreadsheet errors. 


Is your model correct? 

Horror stories abound of minor 
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Interactive features mean easy 
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The Analyst has an automatic feature 
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in each path. 

A cross reference function shows you 
where and how a given cell, Lotus func- 
tion or range is u^. 

A third interactive feature lets you 
explore the network of cells that affects 
a chosen formula. 

Furthermore, you can hop from one 
function to another with one key stroke. 

Ihice the logic of others’ 
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Often you must work with someone 
else’s spreadsheet. The Analyst helps you 
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The Cambridge Spreadsheet Analyst works on all versions of 
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In addition, the Analyst has a MAP 
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Documenting your whole spreadsheet 
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Each interactive function is supported 
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The Analyst can also provide compre- 
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"The Cambridge Spreadsheet A nalysl. . . will 
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A terrific training tool. 

Since The Aruilyst shows up to three 
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device to bridge the gap between 1-2-3 
I A and 2.0. The Analyst works with both. 





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CIRCLE 264 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



THE LATEST IN PC ENHANCEMENT PRODUCTS 





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CIRCLE 108 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



PRODUCTIVITY 


■ PAULSOMERSON 


USER-TO-USER 



Stop Call Waiting from zapping modem transmissions, improve your PAUSEs, debug BASIC 
better, toggle Shift-PrtSc, and pry into Compaq files. 


CALL WATTING ZAPPER 

ll’s awfully annoying to have a long mo- 
dem transmission suddenly disrupted 
when a Call Waiting message blurts onto 
your line. Because of the potential damage 
to data, computer users who spend a lot of 
modem time have resisted signing up for 
this service or have installed second lines 
for their systems. 

Mike Ossing of Columbus, Ohio, and 
Bill Pratt of Redmond, Washington, re- 
cently sent us notices from their local 
phone companies giving instructions for 
canceling Call Waiting on a call-by-call 
basis. To cancel the feature before you 
dial, as spelled out in an Ohio Bell bro- 
chure: "From a 12-button Touch-Tone 
phone dial *70. From a rotary dial or 10- 
button Touch-Tone phone, dial 1170. 
Then dial the number you want to reach for 
a conversation that will not be interrupted 
by your Call Wailing service. ...” 

To cancel Call Wailing during a call 
(incoming or outgoing): "Ask the parly 
you're talking with to 'hold' for a moment . 
Press the receiver button and listen for the 
dial lone. From a 12-button Touch-Tone 
phone dial *70. From a rotary dial or 10- 
button Touch-Tone phone, dial 1170. 
Then, after you hear several bursts of lone, 
you will be reconnected automatically to 
the parry who is waiting on 'hold. ' ’ ' 

Call Wailing turns itself back on after 
the canceled call finishes. And the phone 
company doesn't charge extra for cancel- 
ing the service. If it doesn't work yet for 
your particular Call Wailing service, gel 
in touch with your local phone company 
and complain. 


PAUSE, S’lL VOUS PLATT 

If you disunbute disks with batch files on 
them to non-English-speaking users, the 
message "Strike a key when ready ... ", 
generated by the PAUSE command may 
be meaningless. To remedy this, substitute 
your own mes,sage by using ECHO and get 
rid of the normal English message by redi- 
recting PAUSE to NUL. A French version 
would look like this: 

ECHO OFF 

ECHO Pressec une touche pour continuer 
PAUSE >NUL 

Unfortunately, this feature seems to work 
only in DOS 3.0 or later. 

Chinh T. Nguyen 
St. Bruno, Quebec 
Canada 

Redirecting messages to NUL is a useful 
technique that can also prevent general 
batch file screen clutter. Most real power 
users have learned to start their systems by 
creating a RAMdisk and copying their 
most frequently used files to it. Even with 
ECHO OFF, the result is a siring cf "I 
File(s) copied" messages. To keep the 
screenclean, adda ">NUL" tolheendof 
each COPY instruction. 


PrtScTOGGLER 

It’s really frustrating to hit PrtSc acciden- 
tally . If your printer is on, you have to wait 
until it finishes typing the contents of the 
screen and then readjust the paper to the 
top of the next page. If it’s off, your system 
will hang until DOS realizes that the print- 
er is not going to respond. 

When you hit Shift-PrtSc, DOS issues 


Interrupt 5, which first looks at a location 
in low memory called STATUS_BYTE to 
see whether your system is already dump- 
ing a screen to the printer. If STATUS 
_BYTE is equal to I , DOS thinks a screen 
dump is taking place and exits the routine 
without dumping another screen to the 
printer. If STATUS_BYTE is equal to 0, 
the routine sets STATUS_BYTE to I so 
that it cannot interrupt itself, then does the 
actual dump, and finally resets STATUS 
_BYTE equal to 0 and exits the routine. 

N DISABLE.COM 
A 100 
PUSH DS 
MOV AX, 0050 
MOV DS,AX 

MOV BYTE FTR [0000], 01 
POP DS 
INT 20 

RCX 

E 

W 

N ENABLE.COM 
E 10A 0 
W 

_Q 

Figure 1 : Instructions for creating 
DISABLE.COM andENABLE.COM PnSc 
logglers. Use the DOS COPY CON: function 
or a pure -ASCII word processor ( like 
WordStar’jW mode) to type everything above 
into a file called SCRIPT. Make sure you leave 
a blank line above RCX. and be sure to hit the 
Enter key after each line. e.specially the last 
one. Then put the SCRIPT file onto the same 
disk as DEBUG.COM. Version 2.0 or later, 
and type DEBUG<SCRIPT. 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
405 




Route 
TOVOW 
Software 


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Choose from a menu that you define, 
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Olivet Access menu system Is 
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any program on the hard disk. 

Powerful features include 
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PRODUCTIVITY 

■ USER-TO-USER 


100 ' PRTSCTOG.BAS — by Steve Dozier 

110 OPEN "R",l, "DISABLE. COM", ItFIELD #1,1 AS A$ 

120 FOR X=1 TO 14:READ CHARzLSET A$=CHR$(CHAR) 

130 PUT tl,X: NEXT: CLOSE: RESTORE 

140 OPEN "R",l, "ENABLE. COM", IzFIELD #1,1 AS A$ 

150 FOR X=1 TO 14:READ CHAR: IF X=ll THEN CHAR=0 

160 LSET A$=CHR$ ( CHAR) : PUT # 1 , X : NEXT : CLOSE 

170 DATA 30,184,80,0,142,216,198,6,0,0,1,31,205,32 

Rgure 2: BASIC program lhat creates DISABLE.COM and ENABLE.COM programs to toggle 

PnSefimetion on and off. 


This means you can disable the Shift- 
PrtSc routine with a simple assembly lan- 
guage routine, DISABLE.COM, which 
sets STATUS_BYTE to I . A similar rou- 
tine, ENABLE.COM, can turn it back on 
by setting STATUS_BYTE to 0. You can 
create both files in DOS using the DEBUG 
script in Figure I , or in BASIC using the 
PRTSCTOG.BAS program in Figure 2. 

Steve Dozier 

Tucson, Arizona 

h's a shame DOS doesn't let you toggle 
PriSc on and off directly, but this does the 
trick. If you rarely use the Shift-PrtSc func- 
tion but have a habit of activating it when 
you don't want to, you can put DISABLE 
.COM in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file and 
leave it more or less permanently off. 


BASIC DEBUGGING 

BASIC is great for interactive program- 
ming, but its debugging tools are quite 
primitive. One of the most irritating limita- 
tions is that when you make a simple cor- 
rection to a single line (even a remark) BA- 
SIC flushes all your variables, closes all 
your flies, and forces you to start the pro- 
gram over to test the correction. 

When the interpreter finds an error, it 
prints an error message and halts the pro- 
gram. In many cases, you could continue 
running the program if only you could re- 
enter the offending line and reexecute it. 
To make such on-the-fly corrections, ex- 
amine the erroneous line with the LIST 
command. (Note: the problem line will al- 
ready be displayed if it contains a syntax 
error.) Then type the following command 
in direct mode: 

CHAIN MERGE "CON", ERL, ALL 

The cursor will drop down to the next 
line and wait for keyboard input. Next, re- 


key the bad line, and press Enter and then 
Ctrl-Z and then Enter again. The program 
will continue where it left off The next 
time you list or save the program, it will 
contain the repaired program line. 

Another tip on smart BASIC debugging 
is to avoid error traps (ON ERROR 
GOTO) unless they are absolutely neces- 
sary. They tend to hide errors that need to 
be caught, and you will find yourself un- 
able to get to the root of a malfunction. My 
programs trap errors right at the source, 
then turn error trapping off as soon as pos- 
sible. For example: 

100 Print report — 

110 ON ERROR GOTO 130 
120 GOTO 150 

130 PRINT "Printer ERROR. Hit a key* 
140 WHILE INKEy$>*":WEND:R£SUME 
150 LPRINT "ABC Company Report" 

160 ON ERROR GOTO 0 

170 ' print rest of report ... 

This example assumes that any printer 
errors will surface during the printing of 
the fust line of a report. The error trap itself 
resides directly above the possible error, 
and error trapping is on only during the 
printing of that line. I use a similar layout 
when opening files. Printer and disk EO 
are about the only places that an error trap 
is really needed. You can write program 
code to test for any other potential prob- 
lems without resorting to BASIC’s error 
handling. 

Dan Rollins 

La Crescenta, California 

Using CHAIN MERGE "CON" to fix a 
BASIC problem without shutting down the 
active program is a handy trick indeed. 
Your cursor may temporarily disappear 
while you're entering the new line, and 
you may have to hit the Esc key to erase a 
message on the screen before you type in 
the CHAIN MERGE. . . command, but the 
technique can save a tremendous amount 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
406 


Its 

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PC MAGAZINE ■ 
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PRODUCTIVITY 


■ USER-TO-USER 


of time. Note that while this wilt correct the 
problem line in memory, be sure to save 
the file to disk to make the correction per- 
manent. 

In the report-printing routine above, 
you might want to test the error that BASIC 
catches with an IF ERR=25 THEN... or 
IF ERL= ISO THEN. . . to make sure that 
the actual problem isn't falsely reported as 
a printer error when it's caused by some- 
thing else. However, Mr. Rollins is abso- 
lutely right in his advice to trap all the usu- 
al errors by writing thorough code, not by 
skimping on traps and waiting for a mis- 
take to fall through to an ON ERROR 
statement. 

IBM gets a big black mark for destroy- 
ing its DOS and BASIC manuals. In older 
versions, the manuals were fairly com- 
plete . But IBM now puts some of both man- 
uals' critical information into flimsy ' 'Get- 
ting Started" and "Quick Reference" 
brochures that you're bound to misplace. 


For instance, the error-message listing in 
the back of the current BASIC manual is 
alphabetical only. If you need an index of 
error messages by number, the manual re- 
fers you to a tiny 3- by 8-inch chart in the 
' 'Quick Reference' ' guide that you lost as 
soon as you took the shrink wrap off. IBM 
could have easily duplicated this tiny chart 
in the tnamtal. 


REFRESHING PAUSE 

To pause for a keystroke in BASICA, most 
programmers use either 

IB AS=INKEYS!ir AS-"" THEN IB 

or 

IB WHILE IHKEy$:WEND 

A more natural way is to create a ma- 
chine language subroutine at the beginning 
of your program and then call it whenever 
required. Simply insert the following code 
at the start of any program: 


B CLEAR, 5S8S 

1 DEE SEG-5888 

2 FOR X.-B TO 6 

3 READ y. 

4 POKE X. ,y. 

5 NEXT 

6 PAUSE-B 

7 DATA 8B,18B,7,2BS,33,88,2B3 

and then add a 

100 CALL PAUSE 

(substituting the appropriate line number 
for the 100) whenever you want to wait for 
a keystroke. The example here takes up 
seven lines, but you can use colons to con- 
catenate it all to a single line starting with 0 
and save the line as an ASCII file, then 
merge this file into any of your existing 
programs. I made the X. and Y. variables 
and line number 0 uncommon so that they 
don’t interfere with ones already in your 
programs. 

The key you hit to break the pause is not 
stored in the keyboard buffer after the pro- 
gram execution continues. If you need to 


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aRClE 184 ON READER SERVICE CARD 
PC MAGAZINE a AUGUST 1986 
409 


A 



MICRO CAP and MICRO LOGIC 

on line... 



not in line 







I 


/?oo^ 


it 


I * r I If 


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How many long unproductive hours 
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Both of these sophisticated engineering 
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And here’s how. 

MICROCAP: 

Your Analog Solution 

MiCROCAP is an interactive analog 
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It allows you to sketch a circuit diagram 
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models of bipolar and MOS devices, 
Opamps, transformers, diodes, and much 
more, MICROCAP also includes features 
not even found in SPICE. 

MICROCAP 11 lets you be even more 
productive. As an advanced version, it 
employs sparse matrix techniques for 
Caster simulation speed and larger net- 


^ 

i ‘ ■ 

— ^ 

' 


; 

L ‘ ■ ■ i 


'Typical MICROCAP Transient Analysis" 


works. In addition, you get even more 
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MICROLOGIC; 

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bits each, 10 user-defined clock wave- 
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CIRCLE 497 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



•Typical MICROLOGIC Diagntm- 

Reviewers Love 
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Regarding MICROCAP ... "A highly 
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Demo prices arc credited to the 
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Now, to get on line, call or write today! 

Spectrum Software 

■ 1021 S. Wolfe Road. Dept. F 
Sunnyvale, CA 94087 
(408) 738-4387 




■ USER-TO-USER 


PRODUCTIVITY 


read the key, change the “7” to a “1” in 
the DATA statement in line 7. 

Frank Swenton 
Columbus, Ohio 

This may be more natural than the usual 
methods, but it doesn't really work any 
better and won't compile as is. If you try it 
and do want the keystroke to print, after 
changing the 7 to a I in the DATA state- 
ment, follow the CALL PAUSE with a 

200 PRINT INKEYS 

(substituting the appropriate line number 
for the 200). 


CUSTOM 3,2 DOS 

In the November 26, 1985, issue of PC 
Magazine, Calvin R. Shields provided 
several patches for COMMAND, COM, 
which 1 promptly implemented. However, 
when DOS 3.2 became available, I found I 
had to patch COMMAND.COM again. 


After a short search with DEBUG, I found 
the new locations. For the ECHO + space 
+space fix, type everything below: 

DEBUG COHHXND.COM 

E3A88 83 

E3X89 F9 

E3A8X 82 

E3A8B 72 

H 

Q 

For ECHO OFF defaults for batch files, 
type 

DEBUG COHHAND.COM 
EllSE 82 
E1B2C 88 
W 
0 

The CLS patch in Mr. Shields's origi- 
nal submission is not required — ap- 
parently the programmers at IBM read PC 
Magazine and found out how many lines 
are on a standard video display. 

Ronald J. Berg 
Mountain View, California 

Thanks for the timely hints. Calvin 


Shields's submission (User-to-User, Vol- 
ume 4 Number 24) defaulted COMMAND 
.COM to ECHO OFF (rather than the an- 
noying ECHO ON, which forces users to 
brute-force it off in every batch file) and al- 
lowed an ECHO with two spaces after it to 
generate a blank line. He also explained 
why COMM AND .COM' s CLS command 
cleared an extra line and showed how to 
fix this. 

DOS 3.2 is indeed an improvement 
over its predecessors (and more expen- 
sive, at just under $100). Its XCOPY takes 
much of the sting out of copying and back- 
ing up files. REPLACE upgrades files al- 
most automatically. ATTRIB is a tiny bit 
handier (but a far cry from what it should 
really do). DRIVER.SYS tricks your sys- 
tem into thinking a physical drive is actual- 
ly two logical drives (like the single A:/B: 
floppy on a standard PC-XT). You can 
now specify how much environment space 
you want, and can use FORMAT without 


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PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1 
411 


9 8 6 



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PC-13e.. 

As Low As 

$699.00 

256K. 10 meg Hard Dnve SysiemCALL 

PC-148.. 

..As Low As 

$999.00 

XP5. 20 meg 

CALL 

PC-158.. 

..>ls Low Ai 

...$1499.X 

fOWifftO 


PC-160.. 

..As Low Ai 

...$1399.00 

KP-2000 Portable 

CALL 

PO170.. 

..As Low As 

...$1699.00 

Kaypro-PC 

CALL 

PC-240.. 

...As Low As 

...$2699.00 

ACCESSORIES 




DATA SHIELD 



80 Column Printer Stand... 

CURTIS 

Side Mount SS-I 


Side Mount AT SS-2 

Universal Stand SS-3 

.$34.99 

...$19.99 

Diamond SP-i 

Emerald SP-2 

$29.99 

.$39.99 

Sapphire SPF-1 

Ruby SPF-2 

.$49.99 

...$59.99 

Static Mat 

...$29.99 

Universal Printer Stand 

KENSINGTON 

Master Piece 

...$14.99 

....$89.99 

Master Piece + 

..$119.00 

MULTIFUNC 

AST 

..$299.00 

Rampage-AT 

CALL 

Six Pack Plus 

I/O Plus II 

(179.00 

(139.00 

Advantage - AT 

Preview Mono 

(299.00 

(299.x 

PC Net Cards 

5251/11 On-line 

(379.x 

(669.x 

Ram vantage 

(349.x 

5251/11 Plus 

(71 9.x 

dea 

IRMA 3270 

...$839.X 

IRMA Print 

...$999.X 

IRMA Smart Alec 

...$779.X 

EVEREX 

Edge Card 

...$259.X 

Graphics Edge 

...$219.X 

Magic Card 1... 

Magic Card II.. 

EGA Video Card 

...$99.99 

.$159.X 

.$329.X 


HERCULES 

Graphics $299.00 

Color $159.00 

ffilsSOOSKS 

5251 Emulation $549.00 

INTIL 

PCNC80e7 SMHs 

PCNC8087-2 8 MHz CAU 

PCNC80287 6MHz FOR 

1010 PC-above board YOUR 

2010 AT-above board PC 

1110 PC-above board-P.S. 


300 Watt Backup $379.00 

500 Wan Backup $589.00 

Turbo 350 Watt Backup $449.00 

P12S Power Director $99.90 

P150 Power Director wfModem$l 19.00 
KIYBOAIIOS 

KirmoNict 

KBSISOfKBSISI/KBSISUr CALL 

K&51 52B/KB51 53fKB5149Jr CAU 

MEMORY CHIPS 

4164 RAM Chips (ea.)$1.59 

128 RAM Chips (ea.) $5.99 

256 RAM Chips (ea.) $4.99 


MYLEX 

The Chairman $399.00 

Bob Board $359.00 

Mini Mono $159.00 

PARADISE 

Color/Mono Card $149.00 

Multi Display Card $i99.00 

Five Pack C. S. 03e4K $99.99 

High Res Mono $169.00 

EGA Card $379.00 

Ouadport-AT 

Liberty-AT (128K) 

The Gold Quadboard.. 

The Silver Quadboard. 

Expanded Quadboard. 

LIberty-PC. 

QuadSphnt 

QuadLink 

QuadColor 

Quadboard-AT 

Ouadram EGA 

D 

Color 400 Princeton $479.00 

STB 

EGA Plus $379.00 


CAU 


FOR 

Captain • 64 

YOUR 

Graphics Master 

PC 

VIDEO-7 


IBM EGA Card (EGA).... 









PRODUCTIVITY 


COi^" 


BACKS UP PROTECTED 
SOFTWARE. 

The backup insurance you need to 
protect your software investment, 
COPY II PC makes a floppy backup of 
most prcrtected software quickly arid 
easily. (We update COPY II PC regu- 
larly to handle new protections: you as 
a registered owner may update at any 
time for $15 plus $3 s/h.) 

RUNS PROTECTED 
SOFTWARE FROM YOUR 
HARDDISK. 

COPY II PC makes using your hard 
disk as convenient as it should be. No 
longer will you have to keep your floppy 
disk in drive A with some of the most 
popular business software. Call for 
current list. 


MINIMUM 

REQUIREMENTS: 

IBM PC, XT, AT, 256K jr and most 
compatibles. One or two disk drives. 

128K memory (all available memory 
fully supported). 

Call 503/244-5782, M-F, 8-5;30 (West 
Coast time) with your ^ 1 ^ jn* inhemd. 
Or send a check for 
$39.95 U.S. plus $3 s/h, $8 overseas. 

$ 39.95 

Central Point Software, Inc. 

9700 S.W. Capitol Hwy. #100 
Portland, OR 97219 

CeiitrdPomt 

Software 


Backup utilities also available for the Macintosh, Apple 11. Commodore 64/128 and Atari ST. 


PC TOOLS NOW 
AVAILABLEI 

Put all the most popular disk utilities 
(even undelete) together with a powerful 


DOS interface. Then make them 
resident and you have PC Tools. 

PC Tools lets you run nearly any DOS 

command within emy other 

running program. Just $39S5 plus $3 s/h. 


CIRCLE 155 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


DOUBLE w 

THE OPnON CAPACITY 

OF YOUR IBM 
PERSONAL COMPUTER 

PC-XTRA 

• OIIECT EXTEISIOI OF PC IDS 

• NO SOFTWARE CHANOEt 

• NO HAROWARE HODIHCATiON 

• STYUN8 CONSISTENT WITH IRM 

Add all those special options you> been wanting 
without worrying about tilting plug-in and 
back panel space. 



DEALbRINUUIMlES INVITED. 

$ 54900 * 

F.O.B. SANTA ANA 
.CALIFORNIA RESIDENTS ADD 6% SALES TAX 

PC HORIZONS, INC. 

1701 E. Edinger 
Suite A6, 

Santa Ana, CA 92705 
(714) 953-5396 


9-TRACK MAG. TAPE 
SUBSYSTEM FOR THE 
IBM PC/XT/AT 



For information interchange, 
backup and archival storage, IBEX 
offers a 9-track. IBM format- 
compatible W’ magnetic tape 
subsystem for the IBM PC. 
featuring: 

■ 42 M-Bytes on a single reel. 

■ IBM format 1600 cpi. 

■ Software for PC-DOS. MS-DOS. 

Write, phone or TWX (or information 


BEX 


IBEX COMPUTER CORE 

20741 Marina SI . Chalsworth, CA 91311 
(818) 709-8100 TWX: 910-493-2071 


■ USER-TO-USER 


having to worry about hard disk disasters. 
(And BASIC A 3.2 adds a modicum of EGA 
support.) This lip makes the new DOS even 
better. 


COMPAQ UNPROTECnON 

It’s simple to modify the technique for un- 
protecting BASIC programs described in 
User-to-User. Volume 4 Number 25. and 
PC Tutor, Volume 5 Number 10, to work 
on non-IBM versions of BASIC. Instead 
of IBM's location 1 124, use 1228 for 
Compaq BASIC 2.11. and 1433 for Com- 
paq BASIC 3. 1 1 . If the location is includ- 
ed in the BSAVE operation, you may omit 
it from the BLOAD. Other non-IBM, non- 
Compaq versions of MS-BASIC may use 
entirely different locations. 

Wayne Orr 

Tullahoma, Tennessee 

“Protecting" a BASIC fde by saving it 
with the ",p“ option doesn’t really do 
much other than prevent naive users from 
listing the source code. The technique re- 
ferred to in Mr. Orr's tip will remove the 
flimsy protection. First, get into BASIC 
and type 

BSAVE "UN. P". 1124, 1 

(substituting location 1228 or 1433 if 
you ' re using Compaq BASIC 2.1 1 or 3.11 . 
respectively). 

If you ever try to list a BASIC program 
and see an “Illegal function call" mes- 
sage, just type 

BLOAD "UN.P" 

At this point you .should be able to list the 
source code. If not, make sure you tried the 
proper offset (1228 or 1 433 ) for the BASIC 
version you're using. Then resave the for- 
merly protected BASIC program to re- 
move the effects of the ' ‘.p’ ' permanently. 
The only real way to protect BASIC code is 
to compile it. 


SHARE YOUR DISCOVERIES 

Tell fellow users about your latest discov- 
ery through User-to-User, and we’ll pay 
you $50, plus an extra $25 if you submit it 
on a disk. If you .send a disk, please include 
a printout to ensure against damage in tran- 
sit. Mail your contributions to User-to- 
User, PC Magazine. One Park Avenue, 
New York. NY 10016. Ca 


CIRCLE 194 ON READER SERVICE CARD 

P C 


CIRCLE 161 ON READER SERVICE CARD 
MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1985 





P^OG^Ain^ PtU^ ^1-800-832-3201 corporate and School Purchase Orders Accepted 
CONNECTICUT RESIDENTS CALL 378-3662 OR 8293 


Business Software 



R«A«i Worktnop 


Entry Swim 0«o AceiAAJAP 
or Piy 

EmwpnM OUARMPrPlyAx 
NWoiork 


It V« t rnu 199 00 

EMyPkN II V1 1 OWI0OW S>«»n; 5200 
SupwCate 3 (Mmm 2 V2 1 224 00 

Su^ ProfOCI Plu* 239 00 

PoMfbtM V2?^ 179 00 

Dm t aH w ri OkEmv AccoiMMig 42.00 
OmEm ^ytol or OocEMy Word 3t 00 
DKEuy Raport 31 00 

OmEmv M«w 27 00 

**--'-* — ^--yrcM 

209.00 
135 00 
19900 
22500 


QrapPwnHr CombnVion S« V43 29900 


OnpWnw Plu« 

ARMPm Payro* MoOuM 
IIMo/Hnaw 

Windoo Wbrd (S M* or 3^‘l 



MwrtNcA UuNvtan V2 j 0 
hhcrooofi Chwl V30 
M<roMfl ProiM V20 
M^roMfl Wbrd V30 
IMgom SoRmm AMity V10 
Ennch 


UuMmW 331 255.00 

UuRlrnM Advanagt tWGrapMink 305 00 
OpMi t yWow 
QuAfVAP/Piy or mv (M.) 

Opon Por SuMiM* I 
Opon Par Su*nM4 II 


299 00 
239 00 
479.00 


POMT) twi 5000 
OLMPMfUNV or Poyroll |M ) 
tWWi M MnOjory 


Word Pw(M UOrwy 
Mam Plan 
M m on 9 M iyamt 

SpaPirte CPadtar 
OivUno Ttiaaatfu* 


Harvard PT M or rmi o t; OrapAica 

O^STtSaoSr? 



V15 

amaiing sidakicfc 
Swpanmy vio 
Tbreo PaacM 10 
Undo PMcai 10 aTBCD 
Vdo PaacM 10 <«W97 
TurdO PtacM 30 W9097. BCO 
TVrdo L^nruvo 9 Library 
Vdo Oama a ioritt 
liirdo Edilor toolbo* 

TurdO QrapTiica Tbonm 
TurdO ritilTttt looiboi VIO 
Turbo Tutorial vio 
Turbo Protog 
WOrdWUard 


Cantral PoM Copy il PC 
Oatia Modnoiofy Okoci Accata 
Dam dartaTotma Poninx V25 
Pfrranx 
Pontpakt 1-13 


309 00 
439 00 
102 00 


309 00 

119.00 
17500 
225 00 
229 00 
59 00 
195 00 


CaaowWai Syamm JQiaa 
FHlh Oanamtton •yawma 
Piai Back 


Sroawaysvio 
Hammartab Latmi 
Mayao Smoricom H 
Smoricom H for PC NOMOrk 
MM Or Halo H 
Pro 


LHaboal Batiar Satic V20 
Ijflrea C C«mp4ar 
Run C Profataronal 
Run/C Inia r pratar 


Modula 2196 Boaa 
Moduia aee ist2Ki 
ModulB 2«6 ra097) 

MICfdaoe Wmtowa (Mq 256KJ 
Macro AaaamUar VtO 


CCompUarVlO 
COBOL Com^ V21 
PORTRAN CompMor V13 
PASCAL Compilar V13 
QUICK Baaw fPC Ooi) 
BASIC Compaar V536 

XVI V36 



96 00 

37 00 
74 00 
99 00 
32500 
9900 
175 00 
a 249 00 
106 00 
11900 
92 00 

119.00 
23900 

129.00 
79 00 

59 00 
125 00 

95 00 

62 00 

96 00 
255 00 
229 00 
399 00 
199 n 
195 00 

62 00 
229 00 

94 00 
139 n 
94 00 

329 00 
45 00 


OESOVia* SOW 


i Prokay 40 

Soflatvla 

Printworka tor Ool Matrix 36 W 

SoW wa ia CBarmata 

VI 3 _Tha Ptraonil Paacol 59 00 

64 00 


Oan BnkHn't Damo Prooram 


An Studio 
Sertnoboard Na«»a r oom 
Wawoom Clip Collociion MM I 
Naavoom cm CoHaction Vdl 2 
STSC ftockaiAPL V51 
dua Baitc duo Batrc 
dua 9 MIC Main SariM 
dua Baaic Rtmiima 
IMaen WbrW Ine. 


nGaH^I 

adeer ZBaoic 


2600 
34W 
17W 
22W 
69W 
69 00 
30W 
279 W 

32 00 
21 W 
65W 


_ - 329W 

Paradiaa Hi-Raa QrmMM card 16900 
Cotor/Mono C^ 129 . W 

Shon Color Card SOW 

ShonUonoCwd 96W 

5-Paclt Mulcifunciion Card Atrsoax^iSO W 
Mulb Dim^ Card 175 00 

Modular QrapNca Card 219 W 

PwaM Prmlar Pon ModuW A 

Sanal Port Module A 
Rom 6 Clock Modiia 6 0 m« 4XJ 
Sanal 6 Paraaai. Clock 
Modulo C fmOOOKj 
Para wt 
Bob Board/16 
BoWMG 


50 00 


160 W 


Mono Combo Cwd fPC 


Ooid Ouadboard pi 


42SW 
159 00 
239 00 
239W 
359 00 
359W 
319 W 
16900 
23900 

21SW 


But Moum WPC Pwm Bruaii V50 1 1S 00 
SariM Moum <MPC 

Paint Brvan VSJ) 120 W 


PC MouM WPC PatiH Plua 
PC Moutt/Raadyl Bixidta 
PC MouMfRaadyl/ 
PalniPluB Sundl# 

PC > Mouia/PC Paml 


PW2S6K; 32SW 

OuadEOA« (EnhtfteMQf Adept 1369 00 
Ubarty AT /m720K) 259 W 

uoarty PC EMS Board /tKj too W 
OuadOowd AT (lOOK) 329 W 

STB Tha Chauflaix HT 239 W 

Qranda ByiM/Ar MtXKK) 175 W 

SuparlA)ll 119 W 

Mono Plua rtn f drala/ HO W 

EGA Plua /Ennwi^ Or MMIOrJ 279 W 
Mcmar E<M Maaiar 259 W 

Maaatro MuKrlunction (w/iMK) 359 W 

Cmnain MuMAuiction MMX/ 139 W 

Captain Mutofuncoon /M364/g 109 W 

arapMea Maaiar /Lorua OrMNca/ 266 W 



iNLOModa 
KXP-1092 (lOOepei NLO Moda 
KXP-1592 (leOGptl NLO Modt 


EXP400P I'lacpa; Oaiaywhaal 
EXP400P r»cpa/ Daiayii»itoai 
EXP-5S0P (JOcpei Omyvroaai 
EXRBOOP (40cp$l DaiaywtiaM 


Vtoao 310A Ambar 145 W 

Color aw Hi-Rm ROB 36SW 

Color 722 ROB Enhancad OraplMca 479.W 
Color 725 HwMOt 515 W 

MM IBM Mone ch rotna MorMor 219 W 

IBM Color Uoraior SOB W 

IBM Enunead Coliir Momior 639 W 

NEC XMOl ROB 'MULTISVNC 530 W 


OBB.W 

ISB.W 

41SW 

466W 


HX-B 9* Hi-Raa ROB Cetor 
MAX-12 ir Hi4mt AmOar 
HX-12 12 * HLRm RGB Color 
HX-t2E ir Ht-Aaa ROB Color 
SR-12 12* Super Hi-Rm Color 
SR-12P H»4tea For Pro Cord 


Ouadchromo EnhancM Diaplay 
'hxan 121 12* TTL-Oraan 
122 12- TTL-Ambar 
RQS 520 Color 540x2W rM. 
ROB 630 Color 640«4W rM 
ROB 640 Color 720ii4W rM 


SpaedPak2M 4S6W 

Video 7 

MGA /Mono Oc MMX SMrt Card) 139 W 
MOA* 

riUtorx) Or AdMX Plus Lpnp Card) 159 W 
Vbga E 0 A * (Shut Bowd) 369 W 


Disk Drives/Hsrd DrtvesTTBpe 


BASF OSXO (W) 
Sony DS/OO(10) 
Etopntm OS/OD (H 
MomI DS/DO ( 10) 
Maxal HO tor AT (' 

NasKua 06/00 |iO. 

Varbanm OSAX) (10) 
3MDSX)0(10) 


L«) 


AHoy 

FT-W E 


Entertainment 


3 Tda Unimala Qoll Gama 31 W 


OoSart 6 SanM 20/51** or Sto*) 9B W 


Anooni An Of War 
■laebdMc Arm 
Mua« Conattuci«n Sal 
OnaOn-Ona 
PmbaF Conatruawn Sal 
flaydan Sargon ill 


Cutttiroata. Saaaia 
Oaadiine. Startroaa. 

HrtctVHkar's Outoa or Fooonuky 
Infidol or Sorcoror 
Witnasa. Planallall, or EncHontor 
Zork I. Wislibringor, or Thnity 
Zork H. Zork III, or Suapaci 


27W 

27W 

22W 

24W 

26W 
24 W 
29 00 
24W 
26.W 
24 W 
24 W 
26W 


a MO Sya. V1i)2 165 W 


o Laaqua Bm 
daoll RigN S 


. I SunuMor V2.12 

HbCMproM 

F-15 Eagla or Spdflra Aca 
Haiicat Aca or Solo FNoM 


F^5S^ 360KB Dnua HakiN 109 W 

HCHMO 360KB Slk' W HaigM 109W 
N0d40E-0 aeOKB 5l«* 
iiaif-hamN /AI> II7 W 

tomaga wm' hot Hator* AAoobla' 

Barnoi* Box 10 MB Rua 
nkControiar 1499 W 

Bamoiih Box 2-10 MB Rua 

1499W 

271BW 

549 W 
6SBW 
639W 
SOBW 

7S9W 


BarnouBi Box 2-20 MB Rua 


I 20Me Hard Disk WCotM 
. - - I Camautar 
DnvaCard 20 Mb 
O rivaCard 30M8 
Plua Oayalapmarn 
Rua Hardcard 10MB 


Mtama/ Ota* KM wKti tWai 
ComroAars and Csbita tor I 
Commtotoa 
20M6 Saagam 
/5TS25) HaH HaigM 
30M6 Saagma /SnoM) 
Higi) SpMd 40ma 


«9W 

■n OoUl 
MP&rrs 


' 10* Carnaga 
MSP-15 /idOQM) IS* Carnaga 
MSP-20 /300epa) KT* Cam^ 
MSP-2S (ZOOM) IS’ Carnaga 


Essen 

LXdOtoO 


FX-6S/2M 

LO-60Ck10W 

SO-20W 

IBM IBM Ouralwrimr 
IBM QuratiXrMr II 
IBM ProPnnlar 
JuH 

60W (lOepal Oamywiiaei 
61W (iScpa) OarayaOMi 
62W <30cpa) Osisyvmaai 


619W 

489W 

135W 

130W 

3BS.W 

435W 


12.W 

13-50 

lew 

1750 

29.W 

1250 

17.50 


179W 

23BW 

350W 

32BW 

46BW 


BB9.W 

1099W 

41BW 


e49W 

I06W 

11SW 


NX-10 (f20eptt 10* Carnaga 
SO-16 (I20cpa) 15* Carnaga 
SD-K) (MOeps) 10* Carnaga 
SO-1S (fOOeps) 1S* Carnaga 
SR-W (TOOcpa) KT Carnaga 
SR-15(2 00M) 15* Carnaga 

P-321 24 Pin (2I0ep4) Pm XT' 
P-341 24 Pm r2f6epa) Pm i 5* 
P-361 24 Rn (266cpa) PM IS* 
P-36IC (266 m; Pm 15* Color 


Anchor Automation 
Srgnalman Eiprau 12W 
Sr^Mman Limning 24W 


199W 

23ew 

29BW 

419W 


449W 

46BW 

S65W 

479 W 
Tsew 
lOSBW 
1I79W 


Hmm 

12006 H 


I Oktmaaa 20 Color PrwNar 

Okintmt 20 IBM Inmrtaca 
Microkna 162/163 


Hall-Card 

wtSoftwora /Mwrnal) 335.W 

SmanrrKKttm 2400B tmtatnS) 535 W 

Smartmodam 3W tExwrnaJ) I3SW 

Smanntodam I2W (Eilarrral) 356.W 

SmanmoOem 24W iEiiarnal) 569 W 

Novation 

24W Baud Sundaiona Modem 475 W 

Half-Card 24W «irM>i* Sohwara 475 W 

Half-Card 2400 Hardware Only 419 00 

Proms ttiaua 

Promodom I2W ExIM 269 W 

P'oModom 12006 MTSonwara 209 W 

U S. Robolica 

PaasMord 12W Baud I99W 

Courier 24W Baud 369 W 

Van-TOI 

12W Rut Exwtnal 300n2W 325 W 

PC Modem 12W WCrDaaUUi XVI 325 W 

PC Modem HaHCwd 

' Ik XVI 299 W 


Ordering Instructions 


VISA AND MASTERCARD AL^EPTEO 
to order, call wa anylrma Mor>d» thru Friday 
9Wto90a SMiuday towns W Forfasi 
dairvary ii ordering by man. sand cashiara 
check certified check or rnonay order 
Paraonai and company chads Mtow 2 iwaka 
n ctoM Maaiarcard 6 Visa >nciuM card * 
5 axpiraiion data Connacbcd rasKitnia add 

7b4k UlM tax 

Shnpmg CharsM: Settwara Only-63W 
Mmmum cha^ US Mainland WiinCOO 
ahipmanu add an additional 62W US 
PostM APO. and FPO add 3H (SSW M<n ) 
AJaaka or Hawaii add 64* (HOW Mm ) 
Canadian oreas add KIH (S15W Mm ) 
' Orders axcapi Canada— Wd 16*« 


l^sSi 


Mm I 

Hanbuaw - Raaaa cs« tor afxppmg chargM 
Our PoHey. Wa do noi guarantoa machma 
compaiiMity All proOuda are new and m- 
dude laciory warranty, tharatora ALL aala* 
era final Oaiactma aonwara wm be rapiaead 
by lha aama item only Oafadivo harowara 

wd ba lapiacad or rapauad ■ Od AacTMon 

PncM 6 avariaMity auDiact to changa wnn- 
outrwiica Productapurchaaadmarror. aub 
M ID 204* la slo c king laa An roturrta muai 
hove an authorLUlion number Can 1203) 
179-3^ to oOiain one batora raiurning 


Utllities/Linguages/Grephics 


AlpM lo h yiata Kaywerka V30 


SixPakRua (364A) w/Sidakick 
SixPakPramium (S1?Xy 
AST-3G Modal I M iMAj 
RakhPak 
ShanPak (nMK) 

UO Mmi 
RAMpaga' XT 
RAMpaga' AT 

Advamaga Board /MT26K-PCi«r) 
Advantage Pak /avDOOX-PCAT) 
ASTPramaw a/FUgM SMTiuiamr 
I/O Plua N ClockrSan 
AST-5251/12 Ramola 
Canttal Pomi 
Copy II PC Option Board 
HaiculM 

Manocnroma Graphic* Cent 
Cotor Card 

StwndMk /M«r2X AarrbCC) 149 W 
INTEL Above Board IPOXT w«4X) Call 

Above Board AT (w/iMK) Caa 

Above Beard Piggyback AT (ttniOKJ Call 
Above Board PS (PCixrmBax; Call 

Above Board PS (PCixr w/TSArB) Call 

ie9W 

OrehId'Orehia EGA ' 379 W 

Orch« TurboEGA 619 W 

Conquaal MuHifuncbOn BoardtoK 255 W 
Eccal Mutolundion /mCECAWOK; 379 W 
PC Nat AkMplar Card 329 W 

PC Turbo-ZeSa (Md Mag Ram) 719 W 
EMS 266 Ram Dtughtaiboard 
/Md A4ag) 249 W 

Tidy Turbo ”* “ 


CCS PC Jr Joyatick Adapter 
Curbs 

Syamm Sund fK/XT) 
SMaStnp 
Command Canmr 
Diamond Surga Suppressor 

Ruby Surge Su 

EmaraM Surge . . . 

Sapphire Sum Suppressor 
OamsMaM Daiaahiaid 885 
OatMhmidSiW 
HayM HayM Mach il Joyaiiefc 
HayM MMh W joyatick 
Oama Card HI 
(PC or AT) w/Y Cabla 
Ksnaington Masmrpiacs 
Maaiarpiaca Rua 

MuM^srd 6 tompainr 



CIRCLE 185 ON READER SERVICE CARD 














PC MART 


^ Profit the PMC*^ Wizard says 
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CALL 17181 651-67dir FOR ALL THE DETAILS 




MANAGEMENT CORP 


100 E 2n(tSt Mineoia NY 11501 



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PC MAGAZINE 


AUGUST 1986 














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( IR( LE 5740NREM)I;RSI.RVK E( ARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 

417 


AT TURBO-CRYSTAL " BOARD 

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< IR< LF57()n\ READER SER\ ICE< ARD 


REPRINTS AVAILABLE 

Quantity reprints of articles appearing 
in PC Magozine ore available and will 
be prepared lo meet any special 
requirements Inquiries should be 
directed to Eileen Pfeiffer, Reprints 
Dept . Ziff-Dovis Publishing Co . 1 Rork 
Ave , New York, New York 10016. 
Phone 212-503-5447 



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PC MAGAZINE 


AUGUST 1986 


418 
















PC MART 



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Sundard listings consist ofa boldface lead line (23 characters maximum); 

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A well packaged product can make the difler- 
ence in makir^ a sale Call us now! VISA/MC 
GLENCO DEVELOPMENT SYSTEMS 
3920 Ridge Ave 
Arlington Hts.. IL 60004 
312-392-2492 


VERBATIM 

SS/DO S11.10 

OS/00 $1560 

DS/HD'AT* $31.00 

3.5*SS/DD-DS/OD $20 60/$30-90 

• • • 'DEALER INQUIRIES WELCOMED* • • • 

RIB60NS-ALL TYPES BEST PRICES 

THIMBLES/PRINTWHEELS BEST PRICES 

• • • 'Corporate Accounts Wetcomed' • • • 
A6S.INC 

PHIIA. PA 19102 
(215) 732-4434 (tn(RA.) 

1-800-321-6458 


CUSTOMIZE YOUR KEYTOPS 

Touchdown” Expamters enlarge PC & XT keys 
to fun size kke AT Set of 12— $21.95; Mim-lots, 
4 in set— $10.95 Also, make emulation or 
OisptayWriter 3 on PC easy with Keytop Kits: PC/ 
5250 01 DW3-$21.95. PC to 5520-$29 95 
More' Visa & MC Specify keyboard. Ser)d tor 
free mfo and samples' 

HCXXEONCORP 
Dept PC.P.0. Box 201 
Cornville.AZ 86325 
(602)634-7515 


FABRIC DUST COVERS 

Our 4lh year protecting computers and periph- 
erals with he^ poty/cotton cove^. 

BEST QUALITY— Arrierican made, custom work 
BEST SELECTK)N-6 colors. 1100 styles 
BEST SERVICE-Fasl. Toll Free. MC/Visa 
BEST PRICES-S0 95-$36.95, Shipped Free 
BEST VALUE— Monogram or Saeening available 
COVERS UNUMITED 
POB 381076 

Germantown, TN 38183-1076 
800-821 -7709 or 901 -754-4465 


BAR CODING 


BAR CODE— LABEL PRINTING 

THE LABEL MAKER” prints bar codes, OCR-A 
like and large characters from data entered at 
keyboard or from disk files. Create and save 
unique printing formats and recad layouts. Per- 
forms record add. change, delete, sort and se- 
lect on dek tiles Al. LABELMAKER” pnnts AlAG 
shipping/parts identification labels required by 
Auto Mttrs Requires IBM PC or work-alike. 

TJ SOFTWARE INC 
P.O. Box 2044 
Arlington Heights. IL 60006 
(312)364-1065 


BARCODE LABEL PRINTING 

PrintBar tl is a unique memory resident program 
that prints code 39 and UPC bar codes on Ep- 
son. IBM graphics and LaserJet printers. Prmt 
directly from almost any program, without 
copying data to special print files. 30 day money 
back guarantee. $295 plus $12 S/H second day 
at 

BEAR ROCK SOFTWARE CO. 

PO. Box 212 
Placefville.CA 95667 
(916)622-4640 


BAR CODE REAOERS/PRINTING 

Programs $49'$299 to pnni labels, catalogs, 
pages ol bar codes and/or large graphics chs 
on PC with Epson/Oki/IM printers Bar Codes 
39. i 2of5. UPC, MSI. AIAG. GSA. DOD-LOG- 
MARS Large graphics letters up to 1' tall. Disk 
data, menu-driven, assembly language speed 
Code 39 or UPC subroutines for MS C, LatticeC. 
BASIC. MS-Coboi. Qipper. TurtxiPascal. MS/IBM 
Pascal Fortran. dBaselll Pius. $159 
Readers attach in parallel with teyboard Trans- 
parent to PC & all software— no slot $595 for 
PC/XT/AT. AT&T. IH. Tandy, Zenith. Ldg Edge. 
Sperry, etc. Other models lor Mac. IBM 3176. 
3278. 3180. 3291. & Serial Trm. Options Badge 
Readers. Laser Readers. 16 readers, port 
Cigar-sized 2oz PORTABLE READERS $325. 
WORTHINGTON DATA SOLUTIONS 
130 Crespi Court 
Santa Cruz. CA 95060 
(408)458-9938 


BAR CODE REAOERS/MAGNETIC 
STRIPE READERS 

TPS provides Bar Code and Magnetic Stripe 
Readers/Encoders and combinations of these tor 
simple installation on IBM PC. AT. and 3160 ter- 
minals. DEC Rainbow. Professional, and VT 200 
series terminals. NCR DecisionMate V and PC 
IV; Tl Professional; AT&T/Olivetti: Wang PC and 
VS 4200, Apple Macintosh. Nwlhslar Dimen- 
sion Bar code label printing program $50 w/ 
reader purchase 
TPSELEaRONICS 
4047 Transport Street 
Pak) Alto. CA 94303 
(415)856-6833 


BUSINESS 

OPPORTUNITIES 


Personal computer owners 

CAN EARN S1.000-$5.000 
MONTHLY 

by selling simple services performed by their 

conxxiier Work at home— ri spare time. Get tree 

list ol too best services lo offer. Write 

C.IL.D,N 

PO. Box 60369 

San Diego. CA 92106-8369 


EARN PC PROFITS AT HOME 

Receive needed exposure to earn extra income 
by listing your experience, goals and equip- 
ment. Our database provides low cosilttsk ap- 
proach lo introduce home programmers and 
companies reeding pro^amming help. Send $2 
now for complete into package and application 
Only other cost is $9 appkeahon fee 
HOME PROGRAMMERS 
PO BOX243-N7 
El Segundo.CA 90245-0243 


COMPUTER 

DIGITIZERS 


VIDEO IMAGE PROCESSING 

Turn your PC/AT /XT into a video Capture Sys- 
tem!! Integrate Video technology with your IBM 
computer 

• STORE VIDEO PICTURES ON DISK 

• CAPTURE and PRINT REAL-WORLD IMAGES 

• DISCOUNTED Video/Graphics Line includes 


• ComputerEyes DIGITIZER $229.00 

• Panasonic Commercial Grade $159.00 

B/W Camera 

• CHORUS Photo Base $285 X 

• PC PAINTBRUSH S 89.X 

• VIDEO TELEPHONE by call 

imageData 

• VIDEO Prmter (P-50) $380 X 



* * * ‘Dealer and OEM inquiries Inviied* * * * 

HAL SYSTEMS 

P.O.Box 293 

Scotch Plains. NJ 07076 

(201) 869-8416 (Voce) 

(201) 469-0049 (Modem) 




PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
420 


I BLUEBOOK 


COMPUTER/ 

INSURANCE 


SAnWMtE 

If your computer is enportaiK to you, insure iti 
SAFEWARE prmdes lul repbcemenl of hard- 
ware, media arid ptfclased software. As it^ 
$39ayearcomsiie.theft.ixmersurge,e»th‘ 
quake, water damage and auto acciden Call 6 
am to 8 pm Monday thru Friday Saturday 9 am 
toSpm. 

SAFEWARE. THE INSURANCE AGENCY MC. 
2929 N. High Street. RO. Box 02211 
Columbus, OH 43202 

(614) 262-0559 (OH). (800) 648-3469 (NAT) 


DATA 

CONVERSION 


DONTREKEY.CONVERn 

We use the latest disk, tape, scanning. & teie- 
(xrniTuiications technology to relormal dM 
you. QUKX'.Y AND ACCURATELY. USUALLY AT 
ONE TENTH YOUR CURRENT COST. We trans- 
fer data between word processors, typesetters, 
micros, minis, mainframes. & software pack- 
ages. We sup^ a tul range of consulting ser- 
vices inctudirto Data Custornizalion and Data^ 
Devdopmenl. 

DATA CONVERSION LABORATORY 
67-27 166th Street 
Fresh Meacows.N.Y. 11365 
718-939-4921 


DISKETTE COPY 
SERVICE 


“DUPUCATION SOLUTIONS’’ 

MEGASOFT specializes in all of your Diskette 
Duplication n^s. Our ‘STATE OF THE ART* 
equipment produces 0 defects of the end 
prixluct We also provide ‘AUTOLOADERS* 
BUUCOfSKS'COPY PROTECTION'TECHMCAL 
SUFTORT*S£fiWJZATKW‘FACKAG£ ASSEM- 
BLY arto DISTRIBUTIVE SHIPPING 
MEGASOFT 
RO. Box 710 
Freehold. N.J. 07728 

1-600-222-0490 201 -462-7628 (in NJ.) 


FIXED DISK BIOS/BOOT 

FD(T boots from most popular Hard Disks— QA- 
VONG. XEBEC. IOMEGA. GT LAKES, etc. Adds 
XT-kke BIOS interface to your disk for PC Se- 
curity, mutttoto volumes, rernovable rrtedia sup- 
port optional. No-stot plug-to install^. Spedly 
controller and computer with order. $80-$1B0. 
Add$3shpg.CAtax. 



GOLDEN BOW SYSTEMS 
PO. BOX 3039 
SAN DIEGO. CA 92103 
619/296-9349 


COMPUTER 

SERVICES 


DISK CONVERSION 

We are the oldest and most versatile conversion 
company in the country. We'll electronically 
convert disks, tapes, or mag ctods to your PC or 
word processor. Over 20 bMon characters con- 
verted since 1979. Optical scanning avaHaUe. 
We provide the excellence you expect Text ac- 
curacy guaranteed for disk conversions. 

TEXT SCIENCES CORPORATION 
5430 San Fernando Rd. 

Glendale. CA 91203 
(616)247-0792 


SOFTWARE LOCATORS 

Let us do toe searching for you. Cad us with your 
specific software retirements. Receive your 
ciustom Locator Repot of the programs best 
suited to your software needs. (Custom Locator 
Reports for only $50. Software Conipanies--cal 
us too. Cal or send for our latest UPDATE packet 
SOFTWARE LOCATORS 
1851-6 West Visto Way 
Vista. CA 92063 

(800) 824-7240 or (619) 941 -6636 m CA 


CHANGING WORD PROCESSORS? 

We convert to and from; 

XEROX PC-OOS 

DEC WORDSTAR 

IBM MULTIMATE 

LANCR SAMNA 

WANG MHXMASQi 

CPT Also most CP/M 

systems. WORDPERFECT 

Test conver si ons available. Lowest prices. 

DATA CONVERSION. INC 
6310 CabaUero BM. 

Buena Park. CA 90620 

(714)522-7762 

(600M2M851inCAonly 


FULL SPECTRUM 

of Data Caiversicn Services 

• Quick Tum^nd 

• HigMy Professional 

• Disk or Tape Cc nversions 

• Displaywiter. Wang. IM PC & Hundreds of 
Other Formats 

COMPUTER SYSTEMS SERVICES, INC. 

5 East 16th Street 
New York, IfY 10003 
(212)242-5255 


DISK CONVERSION 
SERVICE 


WP a PC MEDIA CONVERSIONS 

The Oldest media corrversion bureau and trans- 
lator maruitactu'er in the nation! We build the 
devices most others use tor their conversions. 
We conver all maior WP's, IBM PCs, 9-trad(S, 
etc. While maimaining easy editability. Guar- 
anteed best price and turnaround. 

SYSTEMS COMPATBIUTY CORPORATION 
1 East Wacker Dr.. Ste. 1320 
Chicago. IL 60601 
(312)329-0700 

ON WORD 

* ACCURATE OPTICAL SCANNING 
(DIRECT T3 WORD PROCESSORS) 

* PRECISE DATA CONVERSIONS 
(INaUOMG FORMAT COOES) 

* GREAT TURN-AROUND/BEST PRICES 
(48 or 24 HOUR. EVEN SAME DAY!) 

•CUSTOM CONVERSIONS 

(YEa WE SUPPORT -YOU!) 

* CALL US TODAY, CALI US NOW 
ON WORD DEVELOPMENT 

2434 Main St. 

Santa Monica. CA 90405 
(213)399-7733 


24HOURTURN-AROUNDi 

We earned our nationwide reputation for fast 
servkx and tough quality control. Very compet- 
itive prices! We duplicate all 3.5‘. 5.25' & 8* for- 
mats. System 36 and A/T our specialty! Custom 
labels & sleeves ready in only 2 weeks! State- 
of-the-art copy protection and lull packaging 
serviras avaitobie. 


IEEE 488 CONTROLLERS 

The most respected name in GPfB interlaces for 
microcomputers oilers you two IKE 488 Con- 
trollers for IBM compatible Personal Computers. 
Ziatech's experience guarantees you the best 
documentation and most efficient software 
avails. Two-year warrvity. Cal a write lor free 
information padcet. 



ECHO DATA SERVICES, INC. 

Marsh Creek Corporate Center 

Lionvflie. PA 19353 

(800) 441 -8854 (215) 363-2400 in PA 


9 TRACK TAPES TO IBM-PC 

Convert mailing lists or other main frame data 
on 1600 6P1 9-lrack tapes to PC-OOS 5% disk- 
ettes. New automated process guarantees data 
verification . Easy instructions tor load ing to your 
data base (dbi. RB4000. etc.) or hard disk. Only 
$60 per mHHon chars. $95 minimum. Bernoulli 
box$30/M. 

A.S.I.INC. 

1259 El Camino, Suite 260 
Menlo Park. CA 94025 
(415)32^«338 


HARDWARE 


ADD-ON BOARDS 


MEGAMEMORY FOR MINIBUCKS 

Fuly populated TWO MEGABYTE Tall Tree Sys- 
tems boards. Lowest prices in USA. Corporate 
accounts/aedh cvds accepted. Add 2% S & H. 

JRAM-2 $349 

JRAII4-3ABOVEBOARO.. $419 

JRAM-AT $399 

JRAM-AT-3ABOVE BOARD $449 

THE RAM EXPLOSION 
5119ALeesburg Pike, Suite 260 
Fans Church. VA 22041 
703-569-4471 


= ZIATECH 


ZIATECH CORPORATION 

3433 Roberto Court 

San Uts Obispo. CA 93401 USA 

(605) 541 -0488 ext. 101 IH Telex: 4992316 


RUN PC/XT ABOVE AT SPEEDS 

Increase the speed of your PC/XT up to 7 times 
with a Turbo Board. We are the accelerator board 
experts. Choose from several dilerent boards 
depending upon your needs & budget. We 
guarantee satislactiw. VISA-M8stercard-C0.D. 
Call tor pricing. 

Eventt/Chartea^ 

Martotirvg S«rvicM bvc. 


EVERETT/CHARLES Marketing Services Inc. 
6101 Che^AMnue 
Fontana. CA 92335 
(714)899-2521 800443-1863 
(Calif. 800-821-0589) 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
421 




















■ BLUEBOOK 


HARDWARE 

COMMUNICATIONS 

‘INCREDIBLE 0FFER/M0DEMS‘ 


300/1200 BAUD External Modem $98.75 

2400 BAUD Hayes Comp, upgrades 

to19.2K... .-..$395,00 

300/1200 External Hayes Comp $159.00 

300/1200 Internal Hayes Comp $149.00 

VMxdproces^ng & communication $69 

VuTekEGABoard $339.00 


Most hardurare & peripherals avail., CALL! 

SAVE-A-BIT 

2500 39th Ave.NE 

Minneapolis, MN 55421 

612-789*7338 MC/VtSA 


HARDWARE 
COOLING DEVICE 


50^ LESS HEAT 

Get the high performance cooling an expanded 
system needs with TURBO-COOL. It iow^ IBM 
PC/XT/AT operating temperatures by 15-25 deg. 
Prevents costly malfunctions due to excessive 
heat. Ideal tor systems loaded with add-ons. 
TURBO-COOL utifizes an exceptionally Quiet. 
West German, all metal fan. Installs quickly, 
without entering the computer, using existing 
screw holes on the rear chassis. Reviewed by PC 
MAGAZINE 3/25/66. $69.95-PC/XT $79.95- 
AT Add $3 s/h (CA 6%), VISA/MC/COO 
PC COOUNG SYSTEMS 
BonsalLCA 92003-0518 
(619)723-9513 


HARDWARE 

DISKDRIVES 


8 INCH DISKEHE SYSTEM 

Read, write, and format diskettes from IBM 
mainframes, minicomputers, data entry equip- 
ment, etc. Complete easy to use software 
handles EBCDIC conversion. Can read and write 
CP/M 8-inch diskettes (many formats). You also 
can use S-in^ drives for Pd)0S lies; 1200 KB 
per diskette! $1 295 complete. 

MICROTECH EXPORTS 
223 Forest Avenue 
Palo Alto. CA 94301 
415-324-9114 


HARDWARE 

DISKETTES 


LOWEST PRICES ON DiSKEHE 

514'SSD045C DSOOS5C DSHD/ATS1.65 
31i*SSHD$1.45 DSHD $1.85 

• Lifetime warranty • Tyvek slee^ 

• 100% error free • R^nforced hub ring 

• Finest quality • tables & protect tabs 
Free UPS shipping. Minimum 100 diskettes 
Send check or call. CA res. add 6)^% s. tax. 
DATA BUREAU INC. 

1633 Westwood Blvd. Suite 120 
Los Angeles, CA 90024 
(213)47943345 


CP/M ft 1.2 Mb ON PC 

With MULTI-DISK and UniFornvK use 35, 5.25 
and a inch single & double density CP/M for- 
mats as DOS diskettes on your IB^PC or XT. 
Many MS-DOS formats afso si^ported includ- 
ing I6M-AT. HP-150 and Data General 1. Over 
200 formats. Both MULTI-DISK and UrtfomvPC 
tor $225. Disk drives and adapter cables 
available. 

PS ENGINEERING 

RO.Box5106B 

San Jose, CA 95151-5068 

(800) 367-2398; (800) 423-7171 (CA) 


HARDWARE 
OPTICAL READERS 

GIVE YOUR PC an “EYE” 

PC compatible equipment to digitbe (Xawings. 
flow charts, logs, pMures and slides for use in 
electronic punishing or personal publishing ap- 
plications, CAD systems, and arrival storage. 
Resolution over 6)5 x 11 area from 150 dpi to 
400 dpi. ffigher res. for smaller areas. Prices start 
at $3,950. Trainable ch^ter image recogni- 
tion software— $1995. Leases available. 
LANDART SYSTEMS INC, 

140 Cedar Street 
New York, N.Y. 10006 
(212) 227-6600 exL 72 


HARDWARE 

PERIPHERALS 


PCjr ADD-ON DRIVES 

Up^ade your PCjr with our user-installed add 
on drive system. It includes a replacement disk 
controller (operates up to 3 drives), a 2 drive ca- 
ble. external 360K drive(s} & software kx oper- 
ating the extra drives. Prerequisite DOS 21. $295 
(one drive), $449 (2 driw), $149 (controler only). 
$6 shipping. 

«4A 

J&MSYSTEMS.LTD. 

J&M SYSTEMS, LTD. 

15100-A-CentralSE 
Albuquerque, NM 87123 
(505)292-4182 


HARDWARE 

POWER 

PROTECTION 

MEIRICK STAND-BY POWER 

THE MEiRICK STAND-BY POWER SYSTEM 
provides back-up power and protection from 
povrer failures, brownouts, surges, spikes, and 
power hoe noise. The enclosed battery will sup- 
ply a long run time during a power failure. 2^ 
watt system-$365; 400 watt system-$495; BOO 
watt sy$tem-$795. 

MEIRICK INC. POWER SYSTEMS OMSION 
Box 298 

Frisco. CO 80443 
(303)668-3251 


HARDWARE 

SECURITY 


SECURITY PRODUCT SALE! 

LOCKIT ll-PW pn^ectxyn for subdirectories. List 
price $79.95 sale price $39.95. Free reset but- 
ton with LOCKIT I or QUICKON. LOCKIT t-Pass- 
word boot-up module $129.95. User selectible 
PW and 6oot-Only-From-HD mode. QUIQ( ON- 
instant boot-up mo(Ue469.95. MC/VISA, COO 
and qualified RO.’s accepted. 

SECURITY MICROSYSTEMS 
16 Flagg Place Suite 102 
Staten Island. NY 10304 
(718)667-1019 


MAILING USTS 


MAILING LISTS 

Now over 1,500,000 micro owners. Select by 
brand; 311M Apple, 315MIBM PC. 9 phone ver- 
ified reseller lists including 6,026 stores, VAR's, 
chain buying offices. Unix users. 16,000 com- 
puter cornparues. ()ver 75 dierent rnicro and mini 
lists. Call/Write Irv for info. Include your phone 
&tn>e of business. 

TARGETED MARKETING INC-lrv Brechner 
Box 5125 

Ridgewood. NJ 07451 
(201)445-7196 


SECURITY 


DATA SECURITY INSURANCE 

The ‘an rtsk* * Personal Computer Policy from DSf 
includes essential coverages not available with 
other policies: protection against loss of data 
(even from accidental erasure), loss of custom 
programs, and fraud. Especially intended for 
business computers. Cove^ can be bound by 
telephone, 9 to 4 Mountain Time. 

(3ATA SECURITY INSURANCE 
4600 Riverbend Road, PO. Box 9003 
Boulder, CO 80301 

(303) 442-0900, (800) 621-8385, Ext. 494 


TAPE TO DISK 
CONVERSION 


TAPE/DISK/MICROFICHE 

Convert IBM disk (360 KB or 1.2 MB) to/from 
Magnetic Tape (9 Trade 800, 1600. or 6250 BFf). 
$10/360 KB disk, or $40/1.2 MB disk. ASCII 
TAPE. $15/360 KB disk, v $60/1.2 MB disk. 
EBCDIC TAPE. Convert reports from did( to Mi- 
crofiche. Store 206 (11xl4‘) pages on ONE (1) 
4x6' Microfiche. StO/Microfi^. 

TECHNICAL PROGRAMMING SERVICES. INC 
8506 East 61st Street 
Tulsa. OK 74133-1301 
918-254-9622 

TAPE TO DISK CONVERSIONS 

Conversion services to v from over 500 com- 
puter systems; 

—Magtapes 
—Micro Computers 
—Minicomputers 
—Word Processors 
—Typesetters 

Our conversion capabilities surpass most in the 
industry. 

PiVAR COMPUTING SERVICES, INC. 

165 Arlington Hgts. Rd.ilfM 
Buffalo Grove. IL 60069 
(312)459^0 


SOFTWARE 

ACCOUNTING 


CPA’s CLIENT WRITE-UP $250 

Now a low cost, provw system featuring com- 
plete general led^ with flexible report formats, 
statement of change, job cost and optional 
Lotus/dBase interface. Atter-the-fact payroll 
prcxrides earnings records, state u/c, 94Ts, W- 
2*5 and 1099‘s. Runs on all IBM PC/XT/AT and 
compatRiles with 256K. $250 complete-indud- 
tng printed manual. MC/VISA. 

H(WEa ASSOCIATES 
4545 Bissonnet Suite 280 
Bellaire. Texas 77401 
713-661-6652 


CUSTOM PAYROU 

All systems support multiple pay categories, 
calculation of all taxes, user-defined deduc- 
tions. exceptional item handling, a variety ot 
necessary reports, paychecks and W-2 forms. 
Written in PC Basic with full soixee included for 
easy maintenance. Prices start at $695.00 for 
basic system and manual 
OATASMITH.INC. 

Box 8036 

Shawnee Mission. KS 66208 
Phone:(913)381-9118 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
422 


■ BLUEBOOK 


CRYSTAL PAYROLL 

Fast and easy to use Computes wages and taxes 
tff seconds l^nts checks wiinitemued stubs or 
stubs onty (after the tact). Ten user defined pay 
types for hourly, salary, dollar, bonus, commis- 
sion. lips, and piece rate wages, expenses, and 
ten voluntary deductions including 401Ks. True 
multiple pay and deduction rates. Allocation to 
multi GL accts and depts. Multi company Ideal 
tor payroll services Federal, state and local taxes 
with flexible employee options. Quarterly and 
year-end reports Standard $395. Restaurant 
$595 Construction $595. Farm $595 V1SA.MC, 
AMEX 30 day money back guarantee 
CRYSTAL SOFTWARE 
3100 Broadway. Suite 203 
Boulder. C(^do803(K! 

(303)443-5528 

PC-FUND 

The leading tund accounting system tor local 
govts and non-profit organizations Modules in- 
clude General Ledger, Accounts Payable. En- 
cumbrance, Obligation Tracking. Accounts 
Recenrabie, Payroll. Budgeting. Fixed Assets and 
Donor Receipts The system supports up to 99 
lunds. 9999 depts PC-FUND runs on the IBM- 
PC and most MS-DOS and XENIX computers. 
AMERICAN FUNDWARE.INC. 

RO. Box 773028 
Steamboat Springs. CO 80477 
000-551-4458(303)879-5770 

PAYROLL AT DEMO PRICE! 

Your payroll program difficull to use? Here is an 
easy-to-use menu-<lnven payroll program, Fed.. 
St & city tax calculalions. FICA. SOI. & 5 user 
definable deductions User maintamabte tax ta- 
bles allows special pay. Print checks, W-2(s), 
labels & reports Up to 200 empi lor 4 pay-cycles 
ch€Ck/MO$12*$35/h/ 

TKT ENTERPRISES 
7531 East Lee Place 
Tucson, AZ 85715 
(602) 886-7436 ext. 72 

CPA REVIEW. CPE CREDITS 

CFA Review with Pass or Refund Program* CPE 
Hours • Diagnostics for CIA, CMA, CPA Exams 
• Personnel Evaluator • Reauitment • IBM PCs 
or compatibles • Individual. Oflice and College 
Packages Available. 

Advanced Software for Advanang Accountants 


PO 00x6512 
Huntsville. TX 77340 
1-(800)241-9700 
in TX (409) 295-1597 , 

MkroMash MK to MAiuirt My HH» 


MIP FUND ACCOUNTING 

The MIP Fund Accounting System meets the fi- 
nancial and managerial reporting requtremenis 
o( not-for-proiil and governmental organiza- 
tions The System features multiple fund and 
fiscal years, user -defined reports and six levels 
of account coding Modules oliered. G/L A/R A/ 
R. Payroll, Encumbrance. Expenditure Budget. 
Revenue Budget and Lotus/OBase inieriace MIP 
FAS is available lor IBM XT and compatibles 
MICRO INFORMATION PRODUCTS 
6300 La Calma. Suite 100 
Austin, Texas 78^ 

(512)454-5004 1-800-MIP-FUN0 


MONEYCOUNTS^a.l 

Control your cash with our COMPLETE MONEY 
MANAGEMENT SYSTEM that includes Check- 
ing. savings and credit card mar^agement. bud- 
geting. financial statements, graphcs. financial 
database with multiple inquiry le<^. special re- 
ports, pop-up calculator, tutorial and on-line help 
screens Simplifies tax preparation. Great lor 
home or small business Money back guaran- 
tee Only $69 95 VISA.MC Call or write tor FREE 
BROCHURE 



FViRSONS TECHNOLOGY 
6925 SURREY DR NE 
CEDAR RAPIDS. lA 52402 
(319)373-0197 

FIXED ASSETS SYSTEM 
CFAAS" IS a powerful tool for fixed assets ac- 
counting which calculates separate financial & 
tax depr^iation using all standard methods. 
Easy to learn & simple to use. it edits checks lor 
lax code compliance & prepares tax work- 
sheets $695. Visa/MC. 

Free 30 Day Trial. 

COMPREHENSIVE MICROSYSTEMS, INC 
609 Fifth Ave 
Salford. A2 85546 
(602)428-7225 


SOFTWARE 

BUSINESS 


PROFESSIONAL TIME/BILLING 

Handles 400 cbents. 20 partners, BO jOb (&40 
out of pocket expense) descriptions. 20 area of 
practice codes, fixed tee or per hour billings. & 
more Prints Wlmgs. monthly statements, aged 
receivables, & more. Free tetephone support 
$149 (VISA. MIC. AMEX) Other original soft- 
ware Call/Wrile (or FREE CATALX' 
MICRO-ART PRXRAMMERS 
614 Alameda Padre S^ 

Santa Barbara. CA 931(D 
(805) 962-0922 (24 hour) 

TIME ACCOUNTING & BILLING 

TABS IS designed tor use by professionals who 
bill on the basis o1 time (attorneys, accountants, 
etc ). American Bar Assoc approved. TABS is 
easy to understand and operate. STTs full fea- 
ture software is currently in use by over 2000 
firms nationwide PC-OOS, MS-DOS. Novelle and 
IBM PC Networks For details contact: 



SOFTWARE TECHNOLOGY. INC 
620 No 48th. Suite 120 
Lincoln. NE 66504 
(402)466-1997 


BILLING/INVOICING 

MANAGEMENT MATE SOFTWARE SERIES- 
BILLING' designed with simplicity in mind. 
Professionals, retailers, and manufacturers, 
prepare bds or invoices the way you already Imow 
how Produces a professional bill/invoK£. daily 
and monthly summanes. aging reports, monthly 
statements and more. Does not use time or in- 
ventory. $195 Y $5 s/h $35 demo disk 
OEPALANTINO/CATARIOUS 
22 South Clinton Street 
Doylestown, PA 18901 
213)34^771 (215)345-0433 

SPECIALIZED PROGRAMS 

A complete library d customized programs and 
files for bookkeeping, real estate, legal, financial 
property management, inventory and compare, 
ledger, mortgage management, and more. For 
l6M(gi. Lotus®, dbase®. Framework®, etc 
with already filled in examples ready to usell' 
Call us with your special needs 
k-kkifk-k SOFTWARE TRUST 
(a Starw Series) prices start at $95 00 
order Ime 1 -800^4-7688 operator 910 

AHORNEY OFFICE PACK 

A complete ofce management system for legal 
operations with time billing, autocalc, spread- 
sheet. finance functions, oice forms, boiler- 
plate. cli^t track, case track, reminder, search, 
etc. 

Auto office works for small up to 40 attorney 
share, co-partner, or individual co-resident Re- 
quires IBM compat. and Hard Disk. 

SOFTWARE TRUST.a Star* Senesprice$2875.00 
order line 1 -600-824-7866 operator 910 

EZFORMSOR EZSPREAOS43! 

E2-F0RMS, Create/Pnm/Fi-ln/Save, 60^ forms 
incl. WP features, pop-up menus, counter, pro- 
tected fields, solid lines/boies. printer support, 
clear forms overlay. more. EZ-SPREAO- 
SHEET 5l2r-64cw/math.stat , fin,.if/lhen.col 
fml, im/export. etc Both ONLY $73. V/Mc/Ax/ 
Ck/Po/MoOK 

ENERCO ASSOCIATES & AFFILIATES 
403 Nasa Road 1 East. Suite 377 
Webster (Houston). TX 77596 
(713)482-0210 

OFFICE PRODUCTIVITY 

Easy to use; easy to learn; includes, moving av- 
erage, running sum. compound interest, text 
formatting, removal of control characters, cor- 
relation, mean, many others Operates on stan- 
dard ASCI) text files MS-DOS 2.0 Version, 
$1 10.00; 'C Source licenses also available For 
more tnlormation 
MODAL LOGIC COfiP 
PO, BOX 1382 
SOLANA BEACH, CA 92075 
619-481-5707 


dBASE BUSINESS TOOLS 

k GENERAL LEXER (w/departmental rpis) 

* diNVOICER (Billing/Accts. Receivable) 

* SALES ANALYSIS (for dlNVOlCER) 

* X)6 XSTING (Contractors, etcetera) 

* JOB ESTIMATING (works w/Job Cost) 

$99 ea^^s&h Req. 2 OS Floppys or Hard Disk 
met Manual & dBASE 2 or 3 Source Code 
dATAMAR SYSTEMS-(619) 223-3344 
1152 Albion Street 
San Diego. CA 92106 
MaslerCard-Visa-Check-COD 


MILP88-MiXED INTEGER LP 

A powerful menu-dnven system tor soivvig mixed 
integer linear programs with up to 64 integers. 
255 constraints and 1255 variables. Solves 
problems by applying the branch and bound 
method. Features mefude interactive and batch 
operation, spread sheet— style input and edit- 
ing. a storage system for problems, sequential 
file input/oulput. a complete report generator 
Requires 192K $99 with 8067 supportr user's 
guide. VISA/MC 

EASTERN SOFTWARE PRODUCTS. INC. 

POB 15328 
Alexandria. VA 22309 
(703)549-5469 

ORDER ANALYST ARRIVES! 

Introduang ORDER ANALYST with Economic 
Order Quantity and Production Lot Size Anal- 
yses Minimize hidden costs, lower inventory 
costs, and SAVE' 

$5995 MC/VtSA/Amex/Check 
CALLNOWTOXDER! 

DIGITAL MARKETING CORPORATION 
1136-P SaranapAve 
Walnut Creek. CA 94595 
(415)947-1000 

ALL PROGRAM REPORT WRITER 
dPLEX IV reads any file format: COBOL. Base. 
Pascal. dBASE, ASCII, etc. Create your own 
special reports, forms, labels, queries from your 
files Define sorts and selects Exports data to 
Lotus or other spreadsheets or word proces- 
sors. No programming required Dealer kits 
available. PCXS. MSXS. XENIX. UNIX. 
SNOW SOFTWARE XRPORATION 
3330 Fisher Road 
Clearwater, FL 33519 
(013)784-8899 

DATEBOOK/PC ACCOUNTANT 

‘ OATEBOOK a truly integrated desktop orga- 
nizer Color windows, menus, help, alarm, cal- 
ender. notes, calculator, appointments, 
addresses, phone list, auto dial, ful featured WP. 
with mail merge. Assoaate activities with cus- 
tomers or clients CUSTOMIZABLE. 

' PC ACCOUNTANT A personal accounting 
package capable of handling a small business. 
Easy to use; no debits-credits, color windows 
menus, help, account lisl. calculator Pnnt and 
address checks, auto payments, balance ac- 
counts budgets, open items, financial reports, 
graph export to 1-2-3 $39 95 Each + $5 S/H 
BUSINESS APPLICATIONS. INC (BAI) 

3211 Bonnybrook 

Drive North IBM PC/XT/AT & 

Lakeland. FL 33803 Compatibles 

(813)644-5026 $5 S/H with manuals 


PC ORDER PAD 

For Manufacturers. Wholesalers or Retailers. 
MAKE MORE MONEY by automating your order 
processing function Handles Cash and Charge 
sales with an End-of-Oay Cash and Sales Sum- 
mary report Produces a Customer Receipt/ 
Picking slip. Keeps track of Inventory Can easily 
use BAR CODE or XR input Will Import/Exporl 
files in ASC II format. EASY & FAST with lull on- 
line HELP screens Runs on most MS XS com- 
puters with 384K. hard disk. 80 col. printer. 
draw^ rational Ctostom modifications & Sup- 
port available 

CaUMBtA SOFTWARE. INC $249 

10420 S E. Hillcrest Drive Demo $15 

Portland. OR 97266 
(503)654-7722 



PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
423 


■ BLUEBOOK 


THEANDSORCOILECTION" 

Unique concept creates complete, self-con- 
tamed, window-based data management envi- 
ronment in one DOS file, ^plifies everything. 
Combine functions to create your own solutions 
in any application; calculations, database man- 
agernent. modehng, text processing, charts, data 
analysis, statistics, reports, labels, forms, pre- 
sentations. maH-merge. etc. Simple enough tor 
a PCjr, sophisticated enough tor a PC AT. Su- 
perb. 400 page hard-cover manual, with many 
examples From simple calculations, files, in- 
quiries. to complex models, data structures, re- 
ports. when your favorite data manager/ 
spreadsheet/word processor /integrated sys- 
tem cannot provide the solution you need, re- 
member The Andsor Collectionr 60 day money- 
back guarantee USS9S * S5 $&h Visa/MC/ 
AmEx/Chk/MO/COD. Call or write now to order, 
or for into. IBM/PC/XT/AT/PC|r, 128K+. one drive 
or hard disk, morwchrome »id/or color monittx, 
DOS 2.(K. Not copy-protected 






< //uftar 



Go/fectton , 






ANOSOfi RESEARCHING 
181 University Avenue. Suite 1202 
Toronto. Ontario. Canada M5H 3M7 
(416)364-8423 


SOFTWARE 

BUSINESS 

PROJECT 

MANAGEMENT 


EASY TO USE SCHEDULING 

And easy to buy at this pricet 

Only S44 95 for SCHEDULE PRO. a lull critical 

path scheduling program with a sample project 

and complete documentation Can be used by 

any business or indlviclual with Apple, IBM PC, 

or compatible hardware Add $4 00 shipping in 

theU.S. 

H&S SOFTWARE 
Arrasmith Trail 
Ames, Iowa 50010 
515-232-2331 


BEFORE YOU LEAP'- 

Making use of fuzzy logic, a branch of artificial 
intelligence, Before you Leap is able to predict 
the cost and schedule of a software protect con- 
sistently within 20%. BIH. provides a schedule 
for tasks arto manpower loading. 6YL is a must 
tor DP and MIS professionals. Price. $495 plus 
$6 S&H. VISA and MASTERCARD 
GORDON GROUP 
635 North 19th Street 
San Jose. CA 95112 
(408)280-0743 


SOFTWARE 

BUSINESS TIME 
MANAGEMENT 

WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FDR? 

You ought to be using today 's most effective time 
management system, TimeStar” understands 
plain English descriptions of what you want to 
get done. Let it arrange your daily schedules to 
make the best use of your precious lime. With 
all of your commitments organized, you can re- 
lax Savor the present, and let TimeStar'* iwes- 
tie the future. $44 $5s/h (Federal Express) Visa/ 
MC/check. Demo $5 Call us toll tree. 


Tiltt^ar 

For^e //mip of your life! 


TIMESTAR SOFTWARE 
2400 Granite Creek Road 
1-800-327-2400 or (408) 438-5416 (CA) 


SOFTWARE 

DATABASE 


DATABASE DN DISKETTES 

Now you can own these databases on IBM PC 
diskettes. Databases include; Food Facts tor 
nutntion. County Business Facts, County & City 
Facts tor demographics. ZIP Code Facts, (kiv- 
emment Address Facts. Financial Facts, World 
Facts and much more. Prices start at $39.00. Cat 
or write tor FREE catalog. 
MEUSSADATACOMWNY 
12 Balboa Coves 
Newport Beach. CA 92863 
(714)650-1000 


AHENTION SPORTS FANS 

Computer Sports World, the nation's leading 
online database devoted totally to sports, can be 
yours for as little as 36c a minute Allsportsplus 
ihoroughbredracing. Scores and results as they 
happen Wire service stones. Standings, statis- 
tics. analysis, historical data and more Call for 
a tree demo account. 

800-321-5562 or 702-294-0191 
Con^ter Sports World. Inc. A subsxliary of The 
Chronicie Publishing Co. 


SOFTWARE 

DATA BASE 
MANAGEMENT 


INCREDIBLE $34.99 DATABASE 

That'S righti Only $34.99 tor a database that's 
easy to use. yet packed with powerful features. 
Data f bght beats the biggies. Search, sort, prim 
reports, generate forms and maihng lists. DO ON- 
SCREEN CALCULATIONS' Input data using 
screen-forms you create. Completely menu- 
driven. on-line help at the touch ol a key. Shares 
data with other programs like Lotus 123 Up to 
32.000 records per database, automatically in- 
dexed. Includes manual. Unbelievable pedor- 
mance at a revotulionary price. Money back if 
not delighted within X days. Don't let the low 
price tool you— this is a complete database 
manager tor IBM PCs and compattoles. This price 
IS good for a limited time only! Send check for 
$34.99 to: 



SOLO FLIGHT SOFTWARE 
217 EaslB5th Street Suite 194 
New York. NY 10028 
(212)517-7751 


FREE dBASE COMPILER 

Evaluation kit includes: demo disk with 15 PRG, 
10 FMT. 6 FRM. & the results of compiling them 
with WordTech & Clipper. Also, complete re- 
prints of S magazine reviews of both compilers 
including 22 benchmark tests. Also detailed 
Brochures with all features and limitations of 
both. FREE. No obligation. Call 24 hrs. 
dATABASE SPECIALTIES 
PO, Box 2975 
Oakland. CA 94618 
(415)652-2790 


DATA BASE MODULE 

A data base management program that’s. 

• Easy To Use • Only 12 Commands 

• For Beginners as well as sophisticated users 

• Full Cokx Display • Pop up calendar 

• Pop Up Manual • Powerful search command 

• Ultra Fast Sort Command 

• Macro Report Generator 

• Compatible With Our Accounting Modules 

Dealer Inquiries Welcomed 

NATIONWIDE SOFTWARE PC Of PC 

7877 Cessna Avenue compaliHe, 256K 

Gaithersburg. MD 20879 0nly$49 954$5S/H 
(301)963-5802 MC/VISA 


SOFTWARE 

DATA 

ENTRY 

ENTRYPDINT 

Most widely installed data entry system tor PC/ 
XT/AT. Heads-down speed, so^ticated mulli- 
screen applications Features, paint the screen 
form de^n, data validalion. table & file look- 
ups. Help keys, logic processing, reformatting, 
batch totals, verification. 129 KB remapping & 
more. $545. CaH for trial system. 

DATALEX 

650 5th Street 

San Francisco, CA 94107 

(415)541-0780,(800)962-8888 


DATA ENTRY EMULATOR 

Full speed heads-down data entry with two-pass 
verific^ion tor the PC/XT /AT & compatt^. Easy 
screen formatting by your data entry operators 
m minutes. Loaded with features like; ^jto dup 
& skip, verify bypass, constant fields, range 
checks, (able lookups, lull screen paging. & field 
totals Fully menu driven only $3^. Call tor free 
Xday trial period. 

COMPUTER KEYES 
21929 Makah Rd. 

Woodway. WA 96020 
(206)776-6443 


ROOE/PC DATA ENTRY SYSTEM 

Top-raled PC data entry software. Fastest and 
easiest to use Extensive features to meet every 
data entry requirement. Stand alone and LAN 
versions. High-speed data enby keyboard avail- 
able. Demo version includes all programs and 
documentation: $40 ($5 shipping. CA add tax) 
creditabie to full version lor X days. 

DPX. INC 

20623 Stevens Creek Blvd . C1-C 

Cupertino. CA 95014 

(408) 973-9292 TELEX 701111 


KEYENTRY Hr 

Whether iusl starting, or replacing keypunches. 
3741s. or dedicated systems You won't see 
the toil potential of PC-based data entry until you 
see KeyEntry HI, the premier data entry system 
tor PCs $395 to $895 version/quantity depen- 
dent. Complete Evaluation Padi^ |ust $42.X 
delivered. To order, or tor intormation. call now 
SOUTHERN COMPUTER SYSTEMS. INC. 

2732 Seventh Avenue South 
Birmingham, AL 35233 
(800) 533^79 or (205) 251-2965 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
424 



■ BLUEBOOK 


SOFTWARE 

DATA 

MANAGEMENT 

FILE EXPRESS' ONLY $101 

Easiest to use Information Management soft- 
ware on the market Menu driven. Features cal- 
culated fields, sort, search, report generator, 
mailing labels, import, export duplicates search, 
browse mode. A SHAfiE-WARE product. Com- 
plete program with manual on disk $10. Full 
registration with printed manual and support. 
$40 MC/VISA 
EXPRESSWARE-Dept.Be 
P-0. Box 2X 
Redmond. WA 96073 
{206)643-3503. Ext. 21 


SOFTWARE 

DECISION 

SUPPORT 

SYSTEMS 


EXPERT CHOICE 

Designed for today's decision makers— gain the 
competitive edge. Facilitates complex decisions 
based on both objective & subjective factors 
about cnteria & alternatives Uses: procure- 
ment. resource allocation, strategic planning. 
R&D. marketing, finance, employee selection & 
evaluation $495 DEMO DISK $10 



DECISION SUPPORT SOFTWARE. INC 
1300Vincenl Placc-Oept C2 
McLean. Virgmta 22101 
(800)368-2022 (703)442-7900 


EXPERTS? 

A deosion-aide of choice for users in search of 
Artificial Intelligence on a PC. A tufty integrated, 
turnkey Expert System, not just another 'weight- 
and-rate' program (kiides the input of your own 
decision problems and learns (o simulate your 
best intuitive knowledge For 256 K PC's and 
clones. $495 St^Der demo disk $25. Refundable. 
Dr. Paul Hoffman 
MAGIC7 SOFTWARE 
101 First St. Suite 237 
Los Altos. CA 94022 
(415)941-2616 


SOFTWARE 

DEVELOPMENT 

TOOLS 


TURBO EXTENDER 

Tired of fighting Turbo Pascal's 64K limitations? 
Turbo Extender allows your programs to use all 
640K of MSDOS memory lor program code and 
data arrays. Uses separately compiled rrxfdules 
and normal Pascal syntax for parameter pass- 
ing tfxAxiesutiMies to autornaficaly convert and 
maintain mutli-module programs Same high 
quality arxl support as the TurboPower Utilities! 
See ads in Byte & PC Tech or call 406-376-3672 
lor more info. Complete source code on 2 DSDO 
disks & I00pg printed manual $85. Charge card 
orders toll-free at (USA) 800-538-6157x830. 
(CAL) 800-672-3470x830 


TURBOPOWER SOFTWARE 
478 W Hamilton Ave, #196 
Campbell. CA 95008 

METRICS FOR MANAGEMENT 

ANALYZE reads your code and produces met- 
rics on volume, complexity, producfivity & more! 
Management, OA/QC -f Engineers gam valu- 
able insight to scheduling, problem areas, test- 
ng maintenance * * compliance to standards For 
IBM PC Process FORTRAN and X* $495 00* S/ 
H Add Ada (or only $200.00 more’ MC/VISA 
AUTOMETRIC INCORPORATED 
691 Elkndge Landing Rd. Ste. 350 
Lmtrucum. MO 21090 
(301)859-4111 


TURBO FORMS 

Bullet-Proof user data entry. Unlimited charac- 
ter & field level data verification Create & edit 
forms tor data entry & display without recom- 
piling source code. Flexible formatting with 
graphics, windows, colors & display attributes 
IBM PC & compatibles One of PC Magazines 

*14 HOT TURBO UTILITIES* $39.95 including 
S&H. MC/VtSAorCO.D. 

GREAT LAKES SOFTWARE SYSTEMS. INC. 
2510 Capital Ave. SW Suite 203 
Battle Deek. Ml 49015 
(616)962-5260 

dCODER Ml 

A complete dBASE III applications generator. In- 
cludes: database creator, quick applications 
generator, screen form generator, menu gener- 
ator. complele procedural Ibrary. code debug- 
ging, utilities & much more Noneedtoupgrade 
to dBASE III plus with dCOOER III’ 

$79 + $5 s/h (604) 594-5422 ext. 72 

• • • STRIDER COMPUTER CENTER • • • 

1020th St •••••• • 

• • • • Delta. BC Canada V4C 6P5 • • • • 

In the US Call Colleci 


WINDOW.LIB 

An easy to use complete windowing system lor 
programmers and writing in . . 

• BASIC IBM.M-S.CB86 

• C LAHICE.M-S 

• COBOL M-S,RMF 

• PASCAL M-S. TURBO 

• FORTRAN M-S,RMF 

Window editor included. Create callable pop-up 
menus, help screens. The Ime selector features 
auto reverse highlighting and cursor conlrcri. 
$99.00. No royalties. Ask about our BfOS/DOS. 
LIB VISA/MC 

GLENCO ENGINEERING 
3920 Ridge Art 
Arlmgton Hts., IL 60004 
(312)392-2492 

TURBO PASCAL GENERATOR 

GTP APPLICATION DEVELOPMENT SYSTEM, 
version 2 Builds complete, working application 
systems. You give it spec's, it writes error -tree 
code 

• Indexed Data Bases • Multiple Screens 

• Context Sensitive • fi4&nory-mapped 

Help Video 

• Global/Phonetic • Full Keyboard Supt 

Search 

Easy to Use Price$t50.00 Visa/MC. Ck. MO 

AEFINC 

PO Box 928 

Kaly.TX 77492-0928 

713391-8570 

REFER SAVES HOURS 

REF prettyprints program & cross-references 
variables, values, fine numbers (if any), labels and 
reserved words (optionally). 

ENTER adds language support beyond sup- 
plied: assembler, basic, c, cobol. pascal, ada, 
tortran. dbase HI. rbase 5000. 

FINDREPL updates programs. All for $45 
JAMES HALSTEAD & ASSOCIATES. PC. 

1551 Plainfield Road 
Joliet. Illinois 60435 
(815)725-0346 

NO MORE 64K DATA LIMIT! 

THE INSIDE TRACK has been UPDATED to DOS 
3.1 And supports AT's Quick BASIC & BASCOM 
2 Source code included. Not copy protected 
Manual & SO-f programs showing you how to: 

• beyond the 64K data limit 

• Do assembler speed windows 

• How to cwilrol the keyboard 

• Display data up to 10 limes faster 

• Read and write files as fast as DOS 

• Load targe programs faster than DOS 

• Much, much more lor just $65.00 

See our PEEKS'N POKES add under Utility. 
Shipping $3. 00/ord- fiAC&VISAWetcome. 
MICROHELPINC. 

2220Car1yfe Drive 

Manetta. Ga 30062 

(800) 922-3383 In 6a. 404-973-9272 

TURBO PERFORMANCE PACKAGE 

POWER TOOLS" provides procedures for screen 
handling, windowing, keyboard control, inter- 
rupt service routine support and much more 
Turbo AS'^CH supports interrupt driven, buff- 
ered I/O up to 9600 baud tor both COM ports. 
Quality documentation and support, and all 
source code is included. $99 95 each. 

BLAISE COMPUTING INC 
2560 9th Street, Suite 316 
Berkeley. CA 94710 
(415)540-5441 


FASTSCREEN FOR TURBO PASCAL 

FASTSCREEN" adds fast screen output capa- 
bility to your Turbo Pascal programs. Oisple^ a 
tuH screen or window almost instantly Read a 
full saeen or window containing multiple input 
fields with a single procedure call. FAST- 
SCREEN makes ft easy to give your programs 
impressive speed & a clean, professional look. 
Incline assembler & Pascal routines, all source 
incl IBM PC/XT/AT & DOS. Color & mono- 
chrome. $29 95 from TechnisoA 
TECHNISOFT 
1710 Allied Street. Suite 37 
Charlottesville. VA 22901 
(804)979-6464 


SOFTWARE 

EDUCATIONAL 


GRADE WEEK VACATION! 

Average and print out your grades with the fast, 
easy-to-use AEIUSGRADEBOOK program New 
version this year. Contains many advanced fea- 
tures. Not copy protwied. In use by teachers 
coast to coast. Only $49 ppd. District or school 
rates as low as $1. per teacher. Send for free 
hterature. 

AElUSCORP.Depl GB 
PO. Box 700457 
San Jose. CA 95170 
(408)257-0658 


SOFTWARE 

ENGINEERING 


ENG/SCI GRAPHICS 

OMNIPLOT(S) (screen graphics) & OMNIPLOT 
(P) (plotter driver) provide integrated engineer- 
ing/scientific 2-0 & 3-D graphics Mth NO PRO- 
GRAMMING REQUIRED! Menu-driven, flexible, 
professional. Choice of formats tabular/line, 
contour, bar. pie, 3-D wire frame & much more! 
OMNIPLOT(S) $195, OMNIPLOT(P}. both $295. 
MiCROCOMPATIBLES 
301 Prelude Drive 
Silver Spnng. MO 20901 
(301)593X663 


STRUCTURAL DESIGN 

Fast, highly interactive, integrated programs for 
structural analysts and design of BEAMS, COL- 
UMNS. TRUSSESand FRAMESof any material. 
Easily mastered programs result in dramatic time 
savings while producing efficient, accurate de- 
signs Specify PC. XT or AT and send $25 for 
demonstration diskette to; 

C-Squared B-Squared Software Design, Inc. 

Oept.A-2 

763 27th Av^ute 

San Francisco, Ca 94121 

800/621-0051.8x1 330 

415/751-1337 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
425 


■ BLUEBOOK 


NEW18PANNEfl~$7S 

WORD PROCESSOR/CALCULATOft/PlDTTER 
WP Menu or funcbon key commands, search/ 
replace, block, on-screen super/sub/urKJeriine/ 
emph, print preview, help. DOS path support. 
CMX Emulated HP11C 100+ fuTK^ions 25 
64K spreadsheet. 64K programs, fiie/retrieve/ 
edit/p^ programs/data, 6067 supp^. PLOT 
On-screen/printer plots ot calc data. Clear & 
complete manual and telephone support. Re- 
quires 256K. DOS 2.x. $75 Check/M.O. 
SWNNER SOFTWARE COMPANY 
RO. Box 4553 
San Oiego.CA 92104 
(619)296-9939 


ARCHITECTS AND ENGINEERING 

The AEMAS system is designed for Architects. 
Engineers. & other firms where monitoring proj- 
ect costs is rerjuired. Modules ndude; Job Crst, 
Payrofl. A/P, A/R & General Ledger. AEMAS is 
fulfy integrated, includes automatic invoicing & 
tieS'in to most spreadsheet & WP programs. 
Multi-terminals available. 

DATA-BASICS.INC. 

11000 Cedar Road. Suite 110 
Clevetand. OH 44106 
(216) 721-3400 


SOFTWARE 

ENTERTAINMENT 


GOLF ON MARK’S COURSE 

Mark's Course is a challenging 18 holes of reg- 
ulation golf lor two players. Features 16 color 
graphics, music, animation for PCjr & Tandy 
10()0. Pick dub, and stroke past water hazards 
and sand traps on a new course every game. 4 
color version for PC/XT/AT Send $30.00 + $3.00 
S/H in Check or MO. 

FOSTWARE 
906 Panna Lane 
Cleveland. Ohio 44109 
216-398-0496 


SOFTWARE 

FINANCIAL 


RESIDENT CALCUUTOR 

dJinnCal— A PC & compatible memory resi- 
dent. pop-up calculator. Operates in 7 modes; 
standard, scientikc, financial, statistical, date, 
interest rate conversion, print-tape (lor hard- 
copy). HELPS plus 55 page manual. Works with 
1-2-3, Sidekick, etc. $25 plus $4 S/H. VISA/MC 
dJINNI SOFTWARE LTD. 

Box 816, 81 0 West Broadway 
Vancouver. BC Canada V5Z 4L9 
(604)682-2669ext. 101 


8DL ESTATE 

Get your act together! What you own, owe; im- 
portant people, papers; safe deposit boxes; em- 
pioyrnerit data; rixich more. Wide array of results, 
including net worth work sheet. Bequests, final 
plans, too. ‘Most tun we ever had'— Riverside 
CA user group. ‘Just what I need*— Tucson AZ 
user. 

BOL HOMEWARE 
2509 N. Campbell. #328PC 
Tucson, Arizona 85719 
602-577-1435 

LEARN INVESTMENTS 

Learn investments with FINMASTER software, 
complete with 637 pg. hardbound book explain- 
ing all corvepts. Features 10 tiNxiules— borid, 
stock, options, and futures vahiahon, plus sta- 
tistics, time value of money, financial statement 
and portfolio analysis. Extremely easy to use— 
aH data on screen— $69.95 delivered. 

ROBERT W. KOLB. PH.D. 

11355 S.W. 67th Avenue 
Miami. Florida 33156 


SOFTWARE 

GAMES 


PC/VEGAS II 

Poker. Blackjack, Roulette, 1^, Slots— $26. 
Above plus Baccarat and Craps— $39. Exact 
Vegas simulation, includes Help, best bet/odds 
windows. Cross-game scoring. Graphics not 
mandatory. Color or Mono. MS/PC DOS, 128K. 
C Source available, ask. Add $2 for shipping/CA 
res. add61^%tax. 

D&HBEAR SOFTWARE 
PO. Box 10793 
Marina Del Rey.CA 90295 
(213)374-0358 


SOFTWARE 

GENERAL 


GREAT SOFTWARE, CHEAP 

Only $5.95 per disk for absolutely smashing 
Freeware and Public Domain programs. PC- 
Outline, PC-Write, File Express. PC-Desk. 
TurboSpell. Poster/tenner, LItilities Galore lAis 
Databases. Educationat programs. Arcade and 
Adventure Games, and lots morel 
IBM PC. PCjr,, or compatibles send for FREE 
CATALOG, 

PLUS 

33495 Del Obispo. Suite 160W 
Dana Point. CA 92629 

SHOP CHEAP— EAT SMART 

‘COUPONOMIZER-Save more monerj with your 
discount coupons and r^tes. 64K. 

*0IET ANALYZER'Lose those extra pounds! 
Tracks calories + 23 nutrients. Ideal for menu 
planning. 126K. Immediate shipment. 2 week 
money back trial. $49.95 ea. + $2.50 shi. AmEx. 
MC. VISA. Can for free brochure. 

NATURAL SOFTWARE LTD. 

7LakeSt..STE7E 

WhitePtains, NY 10603 

(600)626-2511, (914) 761-9329 in NY (collect) 


SOFTWARE 

GEOGRAPHICAL 

US-ATLAS 

Locates 29.000 cities, with graphic display of 
states. Computes Great-Circie distances. Rods 
all states with cities of (he same name. Locates 
all towns within a given radius. Shows towns 5 
m. either side of a line 40 mi. long. Color graph- 
ics or monochrome, IBM-PC/XT/AT 192K DOS 
2.0. Send $49.95 money ord^ or check. 



USTONPC-PROGHAMS 
1932 Kaysetton Or. 
Jefferson City. MO 65101 
(314)635-3417 


SOFTWARE 

GRAPHICS 


35mm SLIDE FROM YOUR PC 

COMPUTER SLIDE EXPRESS converts graphic 
files produced on the IBM PC into brilliant 3^ 
color slides with color resolution 400% better 
than your monitor. Leave your printouts behind. 
Use high resolution color slides up to 4000 line. 
COMPUTER SLIDE EXPRESS $9/slide. 

VISUAL HORIZONS 
180 Metro Park 
Rochester, NY 14623 
(716)424-5300 


FORTRAN/PASCAL GRAPHICS 

GRAFMATIC (screen graphics): 75 Microsoft 
FORTRAN/MSCAL. RM Professional, Lahey 2.0 
FORTRAN callable subroutines. Prof, graphics 
power backed up by a 100 pg. user manual. 5 
packs in one; gen. utility. 2-0 kiteractive. total 2- 
0 plot support. 3-D plots, 3-D solid models 
(Hidden line removal). $1 35. H-P. H-l plotter? Try 
PLOTMATIC tor complete plotter graphics ca- 
pabHities. Interlace w/6RAFMAT)C. $135. Both 
$240. 

MICROCOMPATIBLES. INC 
»1 Prelude Drive 
Silver Springs. MO 20901 
(301)5930683 


DGITYPESHOP 

Create text ^ns and overhead. It offers a. quick, 
easy and economical way to give that profes- 
sional look to everything Irom presentation aids 
to party invitations. Math, foreign language and 
optional fonts are available now. For IBM PC/XT/ 
AT and Hewlett-Packard or compatible plotters 
$175. 

DECISION GRAPHIC INC. 

PO.BOX2776-PC 
Littleton. CO 80161 
(303)796-0341 


PC*KEY-DRAWTRYIT$1S 

Comprehensive, high-power graphics editor, 
CAD, paint, slide show program. Over ISO stan- 
dard functions plus macros, 64 pages/lay^, 
zoom printer, 64 patterns. novice/Qrpert modes. 
$15 includes manual, software, quick, ref. card. 
Roister $100 for support, updates complete 
printed manual. Shareware. Version 3.1. 
OEOWARE 
PO. Box 595 

Columbia. Md 21045-0595 
301-997-9333 


GRAPHIC PRINTER SUPPORT 

At last IBM-PC graphics support for your dot 
matrix printer. Use the Prt^ key to produce 
quality B&W or color scaled dot matrix repro- 
ductions ot your display on your Epson, IBM. 
Okidata, tOS, Centronics. DEC, Anadex, Oata- 
south, Geminj, Tl B50. Riteman, To^ilba. NEC 
8023, or C. Itoh printers. If your printer is not 
listed, let us know and we will support it. 
GRAPkuS is now available for all versions of 
PC or MS-DOS and will operate witti IBM. Tech- 
mar, and Hercules graphics boards. $49.95. 
JEWEa ENERGY TECHNOLOGIES, INC. 

4302 Southwest Alaska St. Suite 207 
Seattle, Washington 96116 
(206)937-1081. 1-80(T^2828ext.527 

1-2-3 SLIDES BY MODEM 

The PC GRAPHICS SERVICE BUREAU converts 
charts created by LOTUS 1-2-3 and other pop- 
ular business graphic packages into 4000 Nne 
resolution 35mm color slides. The SERVICE BU- 
REAU is on-line 24 hours a day to accept chart 
files via modem dkeetty from your PC. Slides 
deirvered to your doa within 72 hours. $10/$lide. 
no minimum. 



GRAPHIC ELEMENTS, INC 
5524 Green Oak Drive 
Los Angeles. CA 90068-2502 
(213) 463^7-Voice Lines 
(213) 465-8869-Modem Lines 


LQ DAISYWHEEL GRAPHICS 

OAlSYFONT-the ONLY software that lets you 
DESIGN & PRINT custom enlarged fonts/ 
graphics on your daisywheef/spinwriter printer 
with No HARDWARE MODIFICATIONS! Mem- 
ory-resident. perfect for report headlines, bor- 
ders. logos, letterheads, etc. Auto-typewriter for 
envelopes & labels. $69.95 + $5 s/h MC/VISA 
EINSTEIN'S AUTOMATION PROFILES, INC 
1842ndAve. WIB 
New York, N Y. 10003 
1 -BOO-USA-SHOP Operator 667 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
426 



























■ BLUEBOOK 


SOFTWARE 

HEALTH 


COMPUMEDIC" 

PROVEN Practice Management Systen— m use 
4 yrs Patient data management, A/R, state- 
ments. insurance torms. practice anatysrs, word 
processing, recall, delinquent tracking, histori- 
cal data FLEXIBLE: User designed forms 
/reports $3600 Training XT/AT. Dental 
(OentaWare'O cyecarc/oplometry (EYEMate'O 
and veterinary (VetLogic/tm) also available 
Dealer inquiries invited 
DATA STRATEGIES, INC. 

332 S Juniper St . Suite 2t0 
Escondido. CA 92025 
(619)489-9218 


SOFTWARE 

HOBBIES 

ROOTS II FOR GENEALOGY 

Oroani:e your larmly tree and pnnt camera-ready 
family books containing charts, text and in- 
dexes Store. retneveanddispl3yl.000'solfamily 
facts with biographical sketches and source 
documentation Lighining-fast searches and 
sorts. 250 page manual. Satistaction guaran- 
teed Write lor free brochure. $195(* *CA tax). 
COMMSOFT 

2257 Old Middlelield Way. SteA 
Mountain View. CA 94043 
415-967-1900 


SOFTWARE 

INDEXING 

EASYINDEXPLUS- 

Create a print ready index by page # or cross 
reference by fHe name. Wnte a book or program 
Unlimited # of indexes/accessed files. Word or 
phrase indexes up to 59 characters Typeset- 
ting, print, formatting, table of contents gener- 
ation Supports over 100 prmters. $39.95 -i- $3 
Shipment (CA. Res. add $2.60) 

FOREMAN SOFTWARE 
977 Clayton St. 

San Francisco. CA. 94117 
(415)665-6414 


SOFTWARE 

INVENTORY 

INVENTORY MANAGEMENT 

Stock-Master 4.0 inventory system provides 
160+ programs tor Slock Status, Trend Anayt- 
sis, Purchase Order Tracking. Quality Control 
Reporting. Detail Anaylsis. Bill ol Materials and 
more Modular system configured & ’micro* 
priced to your needs Coboi Source available 
APPLIED MICRO BUSINESS SYSTEMS 
177-F Riverside Ave. 

Newport Beach, CA 92663 
(714)759-0582 


(THE CLERK)— POINT OF SALE 

New software gives your small/medlum busi- 
ness the same advantages the ‘big guys' have 
Automatic Sales Slip, Invoices, Inventory Con- 
trol, Discounts. Taxes. Reports & Much morel An 
indispensable management tool! Demo disk 
$4 95 (refundable) Regular $349 95/$1 79 95 
with this ad' Dealers Welcome. 

WDR SALES COMPANY 
9604 Belmont 
Kansas City. MO 

1-800-346-3026x958 in MO 816-763-3029 


SOFTWARE 

INVESTMENT 

PORTFOLIO MANAGEMENT 

5 quantitative valuation models, cash flow anal- 
ysis. diversification index, whal-il testing, se- 
curity search, tax planning and total portfolio 
accounting. 9 client presentable reports. Single 
or multiple portfodo management IBM/PC, AT. 
XT, and compatibles. $295.00. Master card/Vlsa. 
Eligible lor rebate ol 100% of purchase pnce 
through SPEAR SECURITIES, 

QUANT IX SOFTWARE 
5900 N Pori RD. 146-A. PC 
Milw . Wl 53217 
(414)961-1991 


SOFTWARE 

MAILING 

PROGRAMS 

MY-T-MAILER-SaO 

Our users love this sturdy menu-driven worker. 
Secretanes say 'Terrific'* Print labels. 3 x Scards, 
envelopes, any format Customize labels with 
line-by-line printer fonts Sort. Search & Select 
with powerful, flexible, easy user-interface. EZ 
Browse. Edit. & O^e. Print up to 5000 copies 
of one label Also PCirl Req. 1^. $30. 
JOHNSON SOFTWARE COMPANY 
POB 16507 Dept 3 
Seattle. WA 98116 
(206)935-4861 


SUPERMAIL'ONLYSaS 

This easy to use. powerful menu driven program 
is used ^ thousands of happy customers Find 
names in 1-2 sec — No sorting. Features unlim- 
ited records & labels per name AND full screen 
editing. Select labels by zip or name Password 
protection is available Take memos recall them 
later + more! VISA/MC. SEE US IN PC MART 
PLACE MANAGEMENT CORP 
100 East 2nd Street 
Mineola. NY 11501 
(718)651-6700 

FLOWMAIL-$100 

Create/Name separate flies. Merge files. Elimi- 
nale Dups Sort t^ company name, zip. state, or 
data ime. Select records by zip. data line, or user 
defined codes. Print labels 1,3.4 across Report 
format hslmgs. very easy to use Free demo disk 
Carrier route system available for bulk mailers 
w/HO. Call TOLL FREE TODAY! 



FLOWSOFT 


C uMom PtopUfwmtng 


FLOWSOR CUSTOM PROGRAMMING 
875 Franklin Road w 1635 
Marietta. GA 30067 
1-800-628-2826 Ext 886 


PRIVATE ELECTRONIC MAIL 

If your organization has multiple locations, you 
can link tt^ together with AidCom's mail soft- 
ware. EMAT/EMAR. All you need are IBM PC's. 
Hayes modems, and telephone lines You own 
your own private mail sy^em without monthly 
or usage fees. You have total control ol your mail 
communications. EMAT $64.50. EMAR $89.50 
AlOCOM ASSOCIATES 
1664 Trona Way 
San Jose, Ca 95125 
(408)978^13 


SOFTWARE 

MANUFACTURING 


TWIN OAKS nirp2 

• Bills/material 

• Inv. Control 

• Purchasing 

• MRP&CRP 

• Master Sched'g 

• Phys. inventory 

• Std Costing 
TWIN OAKS, INC. 
00x136 


• 22 Modules 

• 128K,PC.XTorAT 

• DOS. 10-3.0 

• Hard/Soft Di^ 

• Online-Realtime 

• Multi User 

• Accig. 


Cottage Grove, MN 55016 
(612)456-1604 


SOFTWARE 

MEDICAL 


UNIVAR MEDICAL SYSTEMS & 
ELECTRONIC CLAIMS 

* Medical Management System— $995 com- 
plete patient & case mgmt system, notes, ap- 
poinlments, olfice & patient reports, super bills, 
stmts, labels, and Insurance torms 

* Medical Pro-Pac— $2195 all of above plus 
custom forms generator, data file sorter. DMS 
System. GL. AP. and Payroll 

* Urn-Qaim Electronic Claims Inierlace for erther 
package shown above $249 (or $395 as a stand- 
alone package with office, patient, and service 
code files) includes communications 

* Buy from the leader m Health Care since 1977 
Fully certified in all 50 states by 29 Carries + 
Medicare and 6C/BS ki many others 
UNfVAIR INCORPORATED 

9024 St Charles Rock Road 

SI.LOUIS.M063114 

314-426-1099 


MEDICAL SYSTEMS WITH ECS 

All PPM products have electronic claims sub- 
mission (ECS) to Medicare & commercial car- 
riers, paper claims too 

• PC « CLAIM $89 95; claims only 

• PC ♦ CLAIM w/lCO's. CPT's & HCPC codes 
$229.95. 

• PC * CLAIM PLUS Claims only w/palient file. 
Complete a claim in one minute $4^ 

• THRESHOLD * TM $1,995.00 claims. A/R 
patient billing. 

• THRESHOLD $3,995.00 Claims A/R patient 
billing, complete practice management, statis- 
tics. analysis. 

• CLAIM ♦ NET Nationwide claims clearing 
house. Full 100% credit on product upgrade. 
PC * CLAIM & PC « CLAIM PLUS both house 
30 day money-back guarantees IBM PC/XT/ 
AT/compatibles MS-DOS 256K. 

PHYSICIANS PRACTICE MANAGEMENT 

1610 South Lynhurst Suite Q 
Indianapolis. IN 46241 
(317)248-0357 

In continental U S. call (800) 428-3515 
Indiana residents call (800) 792-3525 


Medical/Dental Management 

Solo or multi-praciilioner office irKtudes patient 
(responsible party) billing, recall, paper/eiec- 
Ironic claims, aging collections. SuperBill, la- 
bels, diagnostic history, word processing, and 
audit & productivity reports. 24 hour Support. 
6L/AP/Payroll available. Demo $100. AMEX/ 
MC/Visa 2.400> dealers 
CMA MICRO COMPUTER 
55722 Santa Fe Trail 
Yucca Valley, CA 92284 
(619)365-9718 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
427 


■ BLUEBOOK 


DIFFERENTIAL DIAGNOSIS 

Tne INTERNIST runs diRaential diagnoses on 
any combination of 480 symploms tor 331 dis- 
eases Lists symptoms associated with any dis- 
ease Prints &dt^lay$ diagnoses in rank order 
Extremeiy easy to use and fast. IrKludes binder, 
user-manual program & data base diskettes. 
S95 00 VISA MC/check or UPS COD accepted. 
N-SQUARED COMPUTING 
5318 Forest Ridge Rd 
Silverlon. OR 97381 
(503)873-5906 


SOFTWARE 
MEDICAL HEALTH 


DIETAN $20.00! 

Personal det analysis lor home use. Simple to 
use menu driven with on-line help. Analy^ 23 
nutrents importani to your health. Gives diet re- 
duction recommendations Produce detailed easy 
lo read reports. Comes with a large Data Base 
Ot FOODS. $20,00 Plus $2,50 Shipping & Han- 
dling charges 
CAMRASS CORPORATION 
200 14th STREET 2nd FL. 

HOBOKEN. NJ 07030 
(201)798-0567 


SOFTWARE 

MULTI/USER 

SYSTEMS 


MULTILINK USERS!!! 

mSSKEY unlocis !!» REAL POWH ol MulliLinlii 
Control up to 8 jobs from any background ter 
minal. true multi tasking from any background 
partition. Switch lObs with simple key strokes, 
assign private partitions, even make a job in- 
accessible to the foreground console! introduc- 
tory pnce only $79. (MuttiLmk is a registered trade 
mark ot the Sottware Lmk) 

KEY RESEARCH & OEVELOPEMENT INC 
3475 Holcomb Bridge Road Suite 202 
Norcross. GA 30092 
(404)242-0753 


SOFTWARE 

MUSIC 


SONGWRIGHTIII 

MUSICPROCESSW prints professional sheet 
music, with lyrics Full-screen graphics editor 
Transposes to any key. plays tunes Features 
multiple staff & voices, harmony, counterpoint 
basshreble ail time signatures. Requires IBM. 
EPSON or Gemini printer $49 95 ($39 95 with- 
out screen graphics). Send lor tree sample output 
S0NGWRI6HT 
P.O 00x61107 
Denver, CO 80206 
(303)691-4573 


SOFTWARE 

NETWORKING 

THESGETWARE-ORIVENLAN 

LANLink" is a revolutionary, software-driven 
network that's the cost o< tord-drhcn LANs, 
n uses mpensive serial ports instead of net- 
work boards 99% ol PC-OOS software is fully 
compatible The $495 Starter Kit includes net- 
work sottware PLUS cable tor both a server and 
a satellite Additional saleliiie modules are only 
$195 



THE SOFTWARE LINK, INCORPORATED 
6601 Dunwoody Place. Suite 632 
Atlanta. GA 30338 
CALL. 404/998-0700 


SOFTWARE 

OPERATING 

SYSTEM 


"UN/EMULATGR" BY WAWA 

Run CP/M on your PC. or clone at machine 
speed UN/EMULAT(W runs native 8080 code 
and increases DOS performance by 10%. We 
include disk conversion software, terminal em- 
ulators serial transfer utility Available tn 
and 8 MH 2 Starting at $99.95f$5S^H Dealer 
inquiries welcome Write 
WEIT2MAN AND WOOD ASSOCIATES 
580NW99IhWay 
f^mbroke Pines, FL 33024 
Write to: Nancy Weitzman 


SOFTWARE 

PREVENTATIVE 

MAINTENANCE 

OISK ORIVE OIAGNGSTIC 

Memory Minder, from J & M Systems, is a disk 
diagnostic program tor the IBM PC, PCp. & IBM 
compatibles. It checks your drives tor head 
alignment, spindle speed, hysteresis, azimuth & 
more. And. you can use Memory Minder to ac- 
tual^ align your disk drives! $99 plus $4 sh^iping 

«4A 

J & M SYSTEMS, LTD. 

J&M SYSTEMS. LTD. 

15100-A Central SE 
Albuquerque. NM 87123 
(505)292-4182 


MAINTENANCE & INSPECTION 

An easy-to-use computerized method to orga- 
nize, operate, and control an effective preventive 
maintenance system Applicable to any type of 
business or industry. Full screen input and dis- 
plays. plus function key help command Main- 
tains historical data, creates work orders, and 
provides numerous reports. For info, write to: 
PENGUIN COMPUTER CONSULTANTS 
RO Box 20485 
San Jose. CA 95160 
(408)997-7703 


SOFTWARE 
PUBLIC DOMAIN 


THE BEST GF THE BEST! 

Public Domain & User Supported Software tor 
IBM-PC & Compatibles! Wordprocessing. Ac- 
counting. Spreadsheets, Database. Modem. 
Games. Languages, etc., etc. 50 dsks crammed 
tuft— $205.00! or rent tor 2 wks $75.00 Info and 
Super Sampler Disk $6 50. Deluxe Word Pro- 
cessor $6.50. Both $12.00 MC A^SA. 

BLUE CIRCLE GROUP. INC, 

P.O.Box 23502 
Minneapolis, MN 55423 
(612)823-4111 

LASERJET UNLIMITED BOOK 

'A big plus lor anyone with the HP LaserJet * * 
John Dvorak. IntoWorld. 4/21/66. Find out how 
lo create forms, spreadsheets, envelopes, la- 
bels, logos, foreign languages, and math sym- 
bols. Covers Ihe LaserJet Plus. 228 pages. 45 
illustrations $24.95 plus $3 50s/h. Ca Res. add 
6 5% tax Checks/Visa/MC. 

PEACHPIT PRESS 
2110 Mann Ave 

Berketey.CA 94707 

(415)524-0184 


SOFTWARE 
REAL ESTATE 


PRGPERTY MANAGEMENT 

Comprehensive program tor managing residen- 
tial and commercial properties Many manage- 
ment reports including operating statement, 
delinquent rent, lease expiration and transac- 
tion register report. Provides check writing, check 
reconciliation, posting of late lees, recurring ex- 
penses— $395. Investment Analysis— C45. 
YARDI SYSTEMS 
3324 State St . Suite ‘O' 

Santa Barbara. CA 93105 
805-687-4245 

MANAGEMENT & ANALYSIS 

• 'Real Property Management' $395/$595 for 
residential & commercial properties and other 
bkkp'g Flags delinq't tenants; prints budgets, 
checks, invoices & 1099S. No retyping ot recur- 
ring data * ‘Real Analyzer* $195. when decid- 
ing: buy/sdl. exchange, or refi. 30 DAY MONEY 
BACK 

REAL-COMP INC. 

RO. Box 1263 
Cupertino, CA 95015 
(408)996-1160 


REAL ESTATE MANAGEMENT 

The LandMasler— a double entry, comprehen- 
sive, menu driven, and easy to use program for 
all income properties. G/L, A/R. A/R Tracks va- 
cancies, payments, deposits, and leases Prints 
check, statements, and receipts. Reports in- 
clude late rents, expired leases, income/ex- 
penses. and operating statements. $1095 The 
Landlord Investment Analyzer, an investment 
analysis program— $350. 

SYSTEMS aUS, INC. 

500 Clyde Avenue 
Mountain View, CA 94043 
(415)969-7047 

PROPERTY MGMT. SYSTEM 11 

Comprehensive menu driven integrated man- 
agement and accounting program tor residen- 
tial. commercial and HUD properties Reports 
■Klude bal-sht. op-simi, transaction ledger, cash 
receipts & di^semenis, tenant, status, va- 
cancy. delinquency, revenue/sqft. lease expira- 
tion, rent-roll, statements, & notices Provides 
check writing, late fees, & multi-property finan- 
cial reports. $495 

MATRIX SYSTEMS Eval. Sys ~$40 

916 Via Nogales send lor tree 

Palos Verdes. CA 90274 brochure. Dealer 
(213)375-77846x1.72 inquiries invited 

PROPERTY MANAGEMENT PLUS 

A new easy-to-use system tor single or multi- 
family properties Prints, checks, rent state- 
ments and receipts Reports— late rents, ex- 
pired leases, vacancies, income/expenses, and 
operating stalemeni. Includes a bank reconcili- 
ation feature and graphics capabilities! Up to 
70% reduction in management time 
REALTY SOFTWARE COMPANY 
1926 South Paoffc Coast Hwy. #229 
Redondo Beach. CA 90277 
(213) 372-9419 ext 72 


SOFTWARE 

RELIGION 

PGWERCHURCH PLUS!~ 

Church office sottware— Iasi, tnendly and reli- 
able. suits any denomination. Membership, 
mailing, contributions, accounting, attendance 
plus 7 other modules integrated into one high 
performance system Interfaces to dBase III. Lo- 
tus and word processors. Unlimited capacity. 
Just $495 Demo disk $10. Call for details 

Church 

Software 

FI SOFTWARE 
PO Box 3096 
Beverly Hills, CA 90212 
(213)464-0625 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
428 



■ BLUEBOOK 


SOFTWARE/ 

SALES 

MARKETING 

SALES MANAGEMENT 

follow up youl sales leads with FOLLOW-UP. 
Track prosp^ by area, doiars. products, or any 
ol 22 other fields. Sales forecasts and call re- 
ports Labels & mail-merge m Zip Code order 
Has built-in calendar, do kst. and calculalor Data 
IS password protected PC & APCClll Visa/MC 
S89 95 

XYCAD GROUP 

1577 St Clair Ave 

Cleveland. OH 44114 

800-428-6457 in Ohio (216) 589-5788 


SOFTWARE 

SCIENTinC 

DIGITAL SIGNAL ANALYSIS 

Power Perspective II w/graphics FFT/IFT. coo- 
volubon, deconvolution, Hannirtg. Power Spec- 
trum, Cross Correlation. 25 rrxire Graphics 20 
& 30. 8087 recommended, not required Easy to 
use menus FP II $395 or FP I (Fn w/graphics 
only) $149 For PC. PC-XT. PC-AT No program- 
ming necessary 

Alitgalor Transforms Scientific Software . 
PO Box 11366 

Costa Mesa. CA92627 

. (714)662-0660 

FAST FOURIER TRANSFORMS 

Best available' Extremely last and accurate Two 
assembly language subroutines' one for for in- 
teger data, one lor floating point (8087 & 80287 
supported) Forward transforms, inverse, power 
spectra, special modes lor real-valued data. 
Callable from MS-FORTRAN Excellent docu- 
mentation $149 each, or $249 for both 
JW HARTWELL & ASSOCIATES 
Roule 4. Box 1540 
Hillsborough. NC 27278 
(919)732-7951 


SOFTWARE 

SECURITY 


SECURE AT/XT/PC 

'Control systems access, data access! FiXT/S 
controls system boot for most popular XT/PC 
hard disk controllers Vteature tor AT and XT- 
compatible HO coniroiiers segments hard disk 
by volumes, controls access with passwords, 
supports hard disk expansion. $80-$120 ^ $3 
shipping plus CA tax' 



GOLDEN BOW SYSTEMS 
2870 Fifth Avenue, Suite 201 
San Diego. CA 92103 
619-298-9349 


“NEW” BIT-LOCK' SECURITY 

Piracy SURVIVAL > 4 YEARS proves eflective- 
nessol powerful muttitayered security Uses rapid 
decryption algorithms and small reliable port 
transparent security device NOW AVAlABii tor 
PARALLEL or SERIAL porl NEW KEY-LOK' se- 
curity device available at HALF-PRICE 
MICROCOMPUTER APPLICATIONS 
7805 S. Windermere Circle 
Littleton, CO 80120 
(303) 798-7683 or 922-6410 

SMART COPY PROTECTION 
Attention Software Developers 
In the past. Copy-Protecting your programs 
meant inconvenience to the end-user, limited or 
no hard disk support, and a lot ot added ex- 
pense per product copy. Our new Sdtware based 
EVERLOCK System solves these problems For 
IBM and compatibles Call tor into 



Az-Tech Software, Inc 
426 Grandview 
Richmorxl MO 64085 
(816)776-8153 


ADVANCED COPY PROTECTION 

The world's leading software manufacturers de- 
pend on Softguard copy protection systems Now 
Sottguard introduces the SUPERLoK KIT'*— a 
complete software duplicalion and copy protec- 
tion system lor your IBM PC SUPERLoK protec- 
tion stops all copybuslers, lealures lull HARD 
DISK support, requires no special media, no 
source code changes, and supports over 30 
compatibles. FREE demo diskette available 

SeFTGUW® 

SVSTtMS. INCORPORATEO 


SOFTGUARD SYSTEMS, INC 
2840 San Tomas Expy . Suite 201 
Santa Clara. CA 95051 
(408)970-9240 

FAILSAFE ENCRYPTION 

DON'T ENCRYPT YOURSELF INTO A CORNER 
FAILSAFE protects your data by: 

NOT attempting decryption with invalid key 

NOT encrypling already encrypted files 

NOT encrypting program code, unless asked to 

Requires 4 yrs. run time on PC to break key ONLY 

$59 95 Money back guarantee 

JACKSON SOFTWARE 

1729 Mayflower Of 

Carrollton. TX 75007 

214-492-1982 

COPY PROTECTION BY MSD 

The ULTIMATE diskette erx^y protection system 
designed tor software developers and publish- 
ers All IBM PC and XT environments are sup- 
ported which mciudes DOS. BASIC (compiled and 
interpretive) Pascal P-System. dBASE II and 
stand-alone systems. Customized systems 
available. Requires 64K. two disk drives 
MICRO SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS. INC. 

2m West Mam St 
St. Charles. IL 60174 
(312)377-5151 


SOFTWARE 

SERVICES 

RENT POPULAR SOFTWARE 

Finally, you can rent popular software lor your 
IBM or compatible. See how good (hat game 
really is. Try that business package before dish- 
ing out huge amounts of money Not public do- 
main No membership tee Where else can you 
get $75.00 programs tor $5 00? Send $1 00 for 
complete catalog 
RS.O. 

Oepl.PM 
PO Box 272 
Bronxville, NY 10708 


SOFTWARE 

STATISTICS 


SIGSTAT 

StGSTAT includes over 70 programs ol the ^0 
statistical senes, plus many advanced new fea- 
tures Mamtrame capacity (up lo 80 var ) lor 
uni— (e g . ANOVA. regression) * multivariate 
(e g . canonical, factor) analyses, time-senes, 
multidim scaling, crosstab, plots, q/c and more 
8087 support opt 256K. DOS. $595 
SIGNIFICANT STATISTICS 
3336 N Canyon Road 
Provo, UT 84604 
(801)377-4860 

BOWLING"HOCKEY 

BOWLING LEAGUE SECRETARY-maintalns all 

team and ndMduai statistics for any size league. 

Reports on printer or screen 

HOCKEY LEAGUE SECRETARY-mamtams team 

slats lor an players and goalies Keeps complete 

games tnstoncs Five Reports 

BOWLlNG-$44.95 HOCKEY $3995 V1SA.MC 

MIGHTY BYTE COMPUTER. INC 

6040 A Six Forks Rd Suite 223F 

Raleigh. N C 27609 

919-846-0345 

CHEK-IN- SURVEY SYSTEM 

Ql Your ideal m-house survey system should 
have which ol these advanced features'’ 

a) power to handle ^ re$pondents/250 items 

b) graphic output tor feedback by subgroups 

c) menus: 3 level screens: stats/crosslabs ... 

d) iBM/comp; mainx/laser & scanner drives 

e) demo disk: help number, super user doc. 
ORGANIZATION ASSESSMENT SERVICES, INC 
2950 Metro Drive. Suite 305 
Minneapolis, Minnesota 55420 
(612)854-2201 

$79— STATISTICAL SYSTEM 

Menu-dri\«n Includes multiple regression AN- 
OVA (4way. repeated measures, covariance) 
Nonparametrics. discriminant, factor, l-tests 
Forecasting. Cross tabs, plots Much more 

Nr^<I.7Q 

865 East 400 North 
Kaysvilie, UT 84037 
(801)546-0445 


STATPLANIi 

Statistical software tor IBM PC computers Eas- 
iest lo use program available. Complete range 
of statistics including cross labs. ANOVA. cor- 
relation, curve fitting, multiple regression, etc. 
Detailed graphics and tabular output Interfaces 
with Lotus. dBase III and other DIF or ASCII fHes 
Only $99! 

THE FUTURES GROUP 
76 Eastern Blvd 

Glastonbury. Conn. 06033-1264 
(203)633-3501 

STATISTICS CATALOG! 

H you need statistics for IBM PC or APPLE II. call 
us and let our technical advisors help you ^ 
Ihe statistics programs you need Write or call 
now to get a FREE catalog of statistics software 
HSO 

9010 Reseda Bfvd . Suite 222 
Northridge.CA 91324 

1-800-451-3030INAT) 1-818-993-B436(CA) 

THE SURVEY SYSTEM 
An easy to use. menu driven system lor Ihe en- 
try. editing, processing and presentation ot 
questionnaire data The system can produce 
crosslabs and scores in banner format, statistic 
and bar charts Tables and charts are camera 
-ready tor professional presentation. Card read- 
ers and open-end coding/anatysis options 
available. 

CREATIVE RESEARCH SYSTEMS 
1649DclOroOcp! P 
Petaluma. CA 94952 
(707)765-1001 

STATISTICS & FORECASTING 

There are three statistical analysis packages that 
go far beyond anything else available 
w StatPac— the standard for business and In- 
dustry lor over six years. Comprehensive and 
easy lo use StatPac is a tuii-leatured statistical 
package tor professional researchers 

* Forecast Plus— a combination of data man- 
agement, exploratory graphes. and over a dozen 
forecasting techniques It works fast, accurately 
and automatically 

* Goodness-of-fit— a tult-teatured regression 
package lor interactive model building Com- 
mand driven with versatile programming 

For complete information 1-800-328-4907 
WALONICK ASSOCIATES 
8500 Nicollet Ave. S. 

Minneapolis. MN 55423 
(612)866-9022 

ELF-THE STATISTICAL PKG. 

Interfaces with dBase and Lotus files or will cre- 
ate Its own Factor analysis. Stepwise Regres- 
sion. Discriminant analysis 1&2 way ANOVA. 
crosstabs, correlations. t-Test. frequencies, 
transformations Unlimited obsenralions. 500 
variables in database All New And Improved 
Manual $350 + discounts. Call For More 
information 

THE WINCHENDON GROUP INC 
PO Box 10339 
Alexandria. Va 22310 
703-960-2587 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
429 


■ BLUEBOOK 


SOFTWARE/ 

TERMINAL 

EMULATION 


BARR/HASP INTELLIGENT RJE 
WORKSTATION 

Hardware and software communications paOi- 
aQe tor IBM PC. XT and AT Simultaneously 
transmits data to host and receives output di- 
rectly to MVS/JcS2, MVS/JES3. VM/RSCS. and 
CDC/NOS. bypassing TSO and O^S. Emulates 
IBM 3777-2 and HASP on IBM 360/20 Line 
speed 1.200 to 19.200 baud (56,000 bps on AT) 
Supports mutliple high-speed printers beyoixt 
2.400 Ipm (6,000 Ipm on AT) Features con- 
current DOS. LAN support, printer forms con- 
trol. plotter support, urtattended operation, easy 
nstatiation Includes Hardware & Software 




BARR SYSTEMS. INC 
Suite M. 2830 NW4tst Street 
GainesviUe. FL 32606 
(800)-BARR-SYS/(904) 371-3050 


TC-LINK 3270 & 5251 

A tuH line of remote 3270 & 5251 Emulators 

available All developed and manufactured by 

Trisystems The Emulators can be used on all 

IBM PC's in single or cluster configurations 

Features Multiple Host and pnnter sessions. Hot 

Key. File Transfer. Mutliple LU's SNA. X 25 & 

BISNYC Prices from $699.00 

TRISYSTEMS 

74 Northeastern Btvd 

Nashua. NH 03062 

(603)683-0556 


SOFTWARE 

TRAINING 


YOUR KEYBOARD GOTCHA? 

Don I miss the benefits of Dvorak another day 
SureStroke'^/Dvorak gives you sophisticated 
keystroke Iranstator lor DOS apf^ications, su- 
perb Dvorak typing Coach, selt-motivation au- 
dio cassette, transfer letters, keytop puller, 
manual $95 00 pkis $4 00 shipping. VISA/MC. 
AMEX, check You can stroke the Dvorak today' 
Seasor>ed Systems. Inc 
80x3720 

Chapel Hill. NC 27515 
(800)334-5531 (919)732-9391 


SOFTWARE 

TYPESETTING 


HIGH-TECH TYPESETTING 

Transmit your text via toll-tree Imes directly to 
our hilly automated typesetting system. $2 per 
K characters with a $5 minimum. Same day 
service 200 typefaces in sizes up to 72 poinl 
Send $15 » $3 shipping tor our 220 page 
guidebook, a call ton tree and use your MC VISA 
or AMEX 

INTERGRAPHICS INC 
106A South Columbus Street 
Alexandria. VA 22314 

(800) 368-3342 or (703) 683-9414 m DC area 

PERSONALIZED TYPESETTING 
We hold your hand every step ol the way Use 
your own typesetting codes; we customize 
translation tables Typesetting by modem or 
floppy disk Scanning of typewritten manu- 
scripts. Full service art studio design, stats, 
mechanicals Publicalion specialists 850 type- 
faces Instructional manual $5.00 
STEINTYPEINC 
25 West 43rd Street-Suite 711 
New York. NY 10036 
(212)221-5900 


USER FONTS & FONT EDITOR 

• PONTGEN • Edit or design fonts, signatures, 
logos. For HP > & 500, Canon LBP-8 A1 /A2. NCR 
6416. Cordata & Franklin LP-300. $250 • VS 
FONTS •Each letter finely hand-tuned Hundreds 
available. Headlines too. Compatible with MS 
Vybrd. Vi/ordStar 2000, Word Perfect. Pofans Ram 
Resident PnnlMerge. Labelmakei & Forms. 
Printworks. LaserType. fonlaslic. PCLPAK. 
JETSET II and many more S50/disk 


SOFTWARE 


VS SOFTWARE 
PO Box 6158 
Litlle, Rock. AR 72216 
501/376-2083 


SOFTWARE 
USER GROUPS 


WORDSTAR-INFOSTAR USERS 

MUGA otters mdividuai/corporate member- 
ships Benefits include OMNISTAR 9X yearly • 
members onty-COMPUSERVE section • WRITE- 
IN support. Corporate also includes CALL-IN 
support Send self-addressed stamped enve- 
lope to 

OMNak 

MICROPRO USERS GROUP OF AMERICA 
140 Riverside Drive 
New York. NY, 10024 


SOFTWARE 

UTILITIES 


PADLOCK/PAOLOCK II DISKS 

PADLOCK tumtshes the user with a method for 
providing protection against unauthorized du- 
^ication from DOS commands $99 PADLOCK 
it disks come pretormatted with finger-print and 
serialization PADLOCK II disks otter superior 
protection. Ask about our HARD DISK protec- 
tion with uninstall capability MC/VISA 
aENCO ENGINEERING 
3920 Ridge Ave 
Arlington Hts. IL 60004 
(312)392-2492 


UNPROTECT GW-BASIC! 

Thousands of programmers enhance their pro- 
grams and save lime with PEEKS N POKES 
Learn where to find system configuration & con- 
trol keyboard/moni(ors/printefS/RS-232. NEW 
VERSION 3.1 supports AT’s. Quick BASIC & 
BASC0M2 Not copy protected Manual & 60 t 
S ource programs showing you how to 

• Recover I^/GW-BASIC progs saved with p’ 

• Disable Ctrl-Break and Ctrt-C 

• DOS/BIOS calls from BASIC & MS PASCAL 

• Much, much more for |ust $45.00 

SEE THE INSIDE TRACK under Development 
Tools 

MICROHELP INC 

2220Caftylc Drive 

Marietta. GA 30062 

(800) 922-3383 In GA 404-973-9272 


WINDOWING FOR ‘^dBASE nr 

'dWINOOW'*' IS a unique utility program (9K) 
that dramatically enhances the screen presen- 
talions of 'dSASE by* patching itselt into mem- 
ory and adding a series ol new commands and 
functions to the dbase repertoire Using these 
commarxls. the user can quickly and easily de- 
velop menu-dnven programs, create on-line look- 
ups. or simply spruce up thetf 'dBASE* menu 
and data entry screens. 'dWINDOW is a pro- 
gram that IS absolulely magic and dazzling, not 
to mention down right tun*, says Data Based 
Advisor Requires DOS version 2.0 or above and 
IBM. PC. XT. AT or compatible Cost $99 00 plus 
shipping 


f JBERTY RELL 

SOFTWARE 


LIBERTY BEa PUBLISHING 
618NWGbsan. Suite 203 
Portland. Oregon 97209 
Ton Free 800-547-3000 (Dept 606) 


New Cruise Contror'’-S29.95 
Increase Cursor Speed And 
Stop Annoying Cursor Run-On. 

Turn your cursor inioaspeed merchant Make it 
stop on a dime 'Cruise' with (repeal) any key 
without havng to hold it down Time/Oate stamp 
Irom inside any program Turn oti the saeenirom 
the keyboard, or after a programmable tune de- 
lay Compatible with most programs, including 
1 -2-3. Symphony. dBASE III Plus. Framework 11, 
WS-2000, MS-Word, Word Perfect. Q&A. 
DisplayWrite til. Reflex. Lighting, SideKick. Ready. 
ProKey Check/MC/ViSA/AX. please include 
$3.50 shipping/handling. 

REVOLUTION SOFTWARE. INC 
715 Route tOEast 
Randolph. NJ 07869 
(201)366-4445 


MORE DOS POWER TO YOU! 

Scroll past screen out put. recall past com- 
mands & directories, edit text on tuM screen, mark 
blocks to printer or file, capture screens in com- 
munication programs, create help panels Set 
screen attributes TailSacen' powerful resident 
utility. Tutorial. Real bargain $4995 VISA/MC 
CK 



QUALITAS' 


QUALITAS.INC 
8314 Thoreau Onve 
Bethesda.Md 20817 
(301)469-8848 


EASY USER PRINTER SETUP! 

SetHP or CanSet Simple menu-driven and/or 
batch utilities allow lull control over HP LaserJet 
or Cannon printers Supports ALL cartridges. 
Control marguis, copy count. LP1. CPI, Ines/page. 
etc No ESC CXXtES! Network compatible. Over 
150 commands. NEW SCREEN DUMP UTILITY 
w/SetHP Only $49 95 $4 s/h Visa/MC/chk 
ORBIT ENTERPRISES INC. 

PO B0X2875-M 
Glen Ellyn. IL 60138 
(312)469-3405 


IBM Uses CP/M & Apple **• 

"The best CP/M to DOS converter* PC Mag, 4/ 
85. UmForm copies files, formats, reads & writes 
DIRECTLY to 2004 CP/M disks on the IBM PC. 
XT. AT (96 TPI & 8'), Use normal DOS com- 
mands. By Micro Solutions, $59 95 + $3 S&H. 
NEW' Match-Point Vi size card copies Apple DOS 
files to IBM. also reads & writes to Apple CP/M 
disks MatchPoint w/FREE UniForm $185 * $3 
S&H! 

BLUE HERON 
1 108 S. Second St 
OeKalb. Illinois 601 15 
(815)758-2355 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
430 



■ BLUEBOOK 


AT/XT/PC HARD DISK EXPANSION 

'R^ce hard disk with a bigger one, or add a 
second dnve! Vfeature BREAKS THE 33 MBYTE 
BARRCR on standard AT. XT and compatible hard 
disk controllers. Includes multiple v^umes. se- 
curity features, selectable clusters, keyboard lock. 
$60-S120 ’■ S3$hippir>g 4 ^ CATax* 



GOLDEN BOW SYSTEMS 
2870 Fifth Avenue, Suite 201 
San Diego. CA 92103 
619-298-9349 


SCREEN MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS 

SMS IS simpty the best utility available tor de- 
signing. using, and saving color/monochrome 
screens GOSUB's are supplied in BASIC to in- 
put. output, and edit screen data fields Loads 
of extra features We have been in business 15 
years, winning many awards for programming 
excellence Pria $195. demo $50 Manual $10 
VISA/MC PC/XT/PC |r /64K/1 Disk 
ONA SYSTEMS, INC 
PO Box 1424 
Saginaw. Ml 46605 
(517)793-0185 


HARD DISK DIRECT ACCES$'-4.0 

The Ultimate Hard Disk Menu System Orga- 
nises your software programs into a ‘user de- 
fined* menu system Features single key stroke 
access, time usage tracking, custom applica- 
tions. plus much more. Order loll tree today 30 
day money back guarantee MC/Visa 
Onity $89 95. See our display ad 



OCLTA TECHNOIOCV 


DELTA TECHNOLOGY INTERNATIONAL INC 

PO, 80x1104 

Eau Claire, Wl 54702 

To order 1 -800-242-MENU 

For More Into. 715-832-0958 


DESIGN YOUR OWN LABELS! 

Use PRO LABEL to design & print multi-purpose 
labels tor office, shop. iab. and home. Disk la- 
bels. name badges, parts numbers, mail labels. 
& more Set size, d^n label, then pnni 1 to 
1000 Intermix variable and fixed fi^ds & fill n 
changeabledala when printing Do serial num- 
bers. dale stamping Use our pre-saved designs 
or make new ones 100 labels. Pgm, Manual 
$24 95 $1 Shpg. I6M-PC Scompatibles. Free 
fact sheet 

MICRO DATA SERVICES 
PO. Box 631 
M3rsha1tlown.lA50156 
1-800-634-5463/la 800-542-7981 


PAL FOR SIDEKICK! 

F^sonal Appointment Locator automalicalty 
shows convng aKXxntments. searches your file, 
maintains to-do ist. examines multiple calen- 
dar files Resident alarm too! Only$45Cheapat 
twice the price! 

PAL SOFTWARE 
110 Greene Street Suite 126 
New York. N Y 10012 
212-925-1843 


SUPER UTILITY V2.0 

Increase the speed of PC/XT/AT by 200-286% 
Recover lost fifes. Edit disk, etc Add secunty to 
all type of files Test & Analyze disk drrves. and 
muchmore Works lust Wee Mac (Pop-up menus/ 
screen/windows^elp/etc.) S7-OemoDisk, 
$49.95 ea. $69.95 Not protected $3‘Shipping/ 
HVlSA/MC/Check 
SOFTECHNICS 

3212 Beacon Ave South Dept PC103 
Seattle. Washington 98144 
1 -(206) 723-4980 


COPY 11 PC 

Back up most protected software quickly, easily 
Run many programs from your hard disk with- 
out a floppy <n drive A! (Call lor list.) For IBM PC/ 
XT/AT some compatibles Updated regularfy Not 
copy-protected, of course! (also available 
for Apple II. Mac. C64/128. Alan ST.) $39 95 f 
$3s/h VISA/MC/ck 

CeiitmlFbmt 

Softwow 

CENTRAL POINT SOFTWARE INC 
9700 SW Capitol Hwy. #100 
Portland. OR 97219 
503/244-5782 


PROM BASIC TO PASCAL 

BPCONV converts BASICS (or similar BASIC) to 
(TURBO. ANSI) RASCAL 
Transforms spaghetti code to structured WHILE. 
REPEAT, CASE, If at any nested level each other. 
Swrate overlapped code into WSCAL proce- 
dures at top down fashion AH automatic $199 
30 day money back, demo $10 
GOTOLESS CONVERSION 
PO. BOX 50068 
Denton. TX 76206 
(214)221-0383 


DOS PATH Command for Data 

Now Lotus. dBase. WordStar, etc can access data 
files no matter where they’re located DPATHi^ 
works like DOS RATH command— up to 128 dirs 
can be searched Handles output files, file alias- 
ing and virtual disks too Wildcards ok Trans- 
parent Requires only 4K MS-DOS 2/3 $45 - 
$5 s/h. Md add 5% Visa/MC/check/PO 
PERSONAL BUSINESS SOLUTIONS INC 
PO Box 757. Dept. B 
Fredwick, MD 21701 
301-865-3376 


HARO DISK EXPANSION 

Disk Manager allows the installation of any 
ST506 hard disk on PC.)(TAT and compatible 
Volumes up to 256mb' Menu dnven/auto in- 
stall. compatble w/aH vers of MS/PC DOS (does 
not modify DOS), up to 16 volumes, easy to use' 
$125 • ship. Ask about Novell product' Dealer 
inquiries tmnted. 

ONTRRCK 

COMPUTER SYSTEMS INC 


ONTRACK COMPUTER SYSTEMS. INC 
7460 Washington Ave S 
Eden Prairie, MN 55344 
(612)941-4504 


POP-DOWN DATA— 2 . 54 - 

Attn Sidekick own^s See data when you need 
It Conversion iactors. steam tbi & penodtc chart 
dala. pipe & tubing dim'l data, area codes by 
states or num order. Rqrs Sidekick Also steam 
data m DIF format & simplified formulae tor use 
m TKISolver. spreadsheets, a your prog IBM PC, 
{r.ldisk S20>$3s&h 
MAJORMICRO 
PO Box 972 
Ortand Park. II 60462 


DISK ACCELERATOR 

DiSkCache speeds up your hard disk access by 
keeping frequently used sectors in memory. Su- 
perior to RAMDISK transparent. Ilex4)fe. config- 
urable. no hardware changes RAM. EM5. and 
AT extended memory versions inci Not copy 
protected VtSA.MC.volumediscounis.noPO's 
without prior approval. $37.00 
DATAMORPHICSLTO 
PO. Box 820 

Slittsville. Ontario. Canada KOA 3GO 
Or call (613) 636-2670 

AUTOMENU" VERSION 4.0 

Create one menu system to run all your pro- 
grams. batch files and DOS commands 'insu- 
lates* novices, many options for power users. On- 
screen help, password protection, user-defined 
prompts Written m assembler 16K size Over 
7.000 satisfied users Money back guarantee $46 
* $4 S/H chk/VISA/MC, 

MAGEE ENTERPRtSES 

MAGEE ENTERPRISES 
6577 Peachtree Industrial Blvd . Dept M8 
Norcross.GA 30092-3796/USA 
404-446-6611 


NEWKEY 3.0— NEW FOR 86 

Keyboard macro processor Features fixed and 
vanabte length pauses, editable macro fries, pop- 
up macro display. screensaver, cut & paste, etc. 
Low memory usage, (juded tour tutonal. 80 page 
pnnted manual with index See Oct 29 PC Mag 
rav review 30 day money back guarantee $24.95 
•$250 S/H Chk/MO 
FAB SOFTWARE 
PO 80x336 
Wayland.MA01778 


DISK UPGRADE BIOS FOR ATs 

DUB- 14 overrides AT Drive Table to allow any 
compatible drive to be attached and fully used 
on the standard AT controller Two ROMs plug 
into empty sockets on system board includes 
complete Set-Up routine and low-levei formal 
tacility Works with UNIX. XENIX, other 0$ and 
networks $95 * $3 Shpg. CA tax 



GaOEN BOW SYSTEMS 
2870 Fifth Avenue, Suite 201 
San0iego.CA92103 
619-298-9349 


REPEAT PERFORMANCE- 

SPEEDS UP IBM PC KEYBOARD to allow HIGH 
SPEED TYPING .30% greater productivity AC- 
CELERATES CURSOR movement/editing/ 
scrolling You set adfuslable repeal speed and 
delay, SKID SOUELCH" leature STOPS cursor 
& scrcriling INSTANTLY when key is released 
Less than 2k resident WARNING ADDICTIVE' 
IBM PC/XT/AT compat $ back guar $39.95 + 
$5p&h Visa/MC/AMX/CK 
SITE LICENSING from 2nd copy' 



POPULAR DEMAND. INC, 
62 South 1025 East 
Undon, UT 84062 
(801)785^101 


SOFTWARE 

WORD 

PROCESSING 


THE IDEA LIBRARIAN 

Writers, researchers, all creative workers get 
organized with SQUARENOTE " Type & edit notes 
of up to 10 PAGES & 100 keywords each Pow- 
erful global operators on ke^ds. transfer text 
to & from most word processors, browse through 
a set of notes, contexl-sensilive help, tutonal & 
reference manual Not copy protected 30 day 
money-back guarantee $69.95 -> $5 s/h. Check/ 
VISA/MC 



UNIONSQUAREWARE 
265 Washington SI /PO Box 228 
Somerville, MA 02143 
(617)623-3023/800-334-08546x1 583 


PC MAGAZINE • AUGUST 1986 
431 


■ BLUEBOOK 


^ESCRIBE EN ESPANOL? 

Escntxen ' is the only Spanish-ianguage spell- 
ing checker for IBM Pc and compatibles. Ver- 
sions tor WordPerfect. Multimale and Wordstar 
ASCII files Features as in best English- 
language checkers but designed tor Spanish, 
includes on-lit>e verb con}ugalion. Full version 
129 95 demo is 14.95 and includes full 
documentation 
IBERSOFTINC. 

PO. Box 3455 

Trenton, N.J 08619 MC/VISA 
{609)890-1496 CALL NOW 


THOR'"— The Critically Acclaimed 
Personal Information Retrieval 
System— Now $79.95 

Managers, professionals, and educators— use 
THOR to record your thoughts, memos, letters, 
mating notes. Mlow-ups. bnets. and appoint- 
ments Retrieve them instantly by calegory(ies). 
time period, or matching text. THOR combines 
the free format stmpiicity of a word processor with 
the organizational power a data base. See r^ 
views in PC. PC World, PC Products, Personal 
Computing. NewVer 1.9 includes tutorial. Check/ 
MC/VISA/AX; include $6 shipping/handling. 
REVOLUTION SOFTWARE. INC. 

715 Route 10 East 
Randolph. NJ 07669 
(201)366-4445 


PC-WRITE NEW VERSION 2.6! 

New in 2.6' automatic reformatting, optional 
menus, more on-screen help. LaserJet + sup- 
port, wonderful new manual. Mailmerge, ma- 
cros. split screen, over 200 printers Try diskette 
with full sottware/Quick guide $10. Roister for 
wordbound manual, support/update/news- 
leiler $75. Shareware OK to copy & share 
Visa/MC- 
QUICKSOFT 
219 First North #224C 
Seattle. WA 98109 
(206)282-0452 


MYWORDMSJUSTS35 

Emulates ws Fuil-teatured. full screen word 
processor (or IBM PC/XT/AT/|r or compatibles 
Wordwrap; search/r^ace; block ops: headers 
& footers: sort, adds row/column: calculator: 
maaos: merge-print, quick print 256 CHARS. 
Allows color & customizing 1l)0 + ops: won't lose 
text: utilities: translate ws files to ASCII or back 
Help screen: printed manual (index/labie of 
contents), fully supported Source add $35 DOS 
1 1-3.0 126K. 1 drive, use any printer. 30 day 
money-back guarantee' 

TNT SOFTWARE INC 
34069 Hainesville Road 
Round Lake. IL 60073 
(312)223-0832 


PROINDEX 

Need an index tor the back of a thesis, book, 
software manual, or report Takes any word 
processed document and a reference list, c^^ 
ates an index. Selectable page/lme references, 
case sensitivity, interactive/batch, handles 
ASCII. WordStar. & 6 bit data $89.95 includes 
disk, manual, & shipping. VISA/MC 
ELFRING CONSULTING, INC. 

4N899West Mary Drive 
St Charles, Illinois 60174 
312-377-3520 


PC-OUTLINE— EDITOR’S CHOICE! 

SUPER-OUTLINER! New Fast. Memory resi- 
dent option (85k). Auto-numbenng. Nine Out- 
lines/Windows, Pull-down menus. Advanced 
editing. Hide/Unhide any portion Chosen by 
many over all competition. Shareware Disk, 
Manual, Support: SM.95. 

SOFTWORKS DEVELOPMENT 
750 Stierlin Rd. Suite 142 
Mountain View, CA 94043 
800-536-8157 ext. 844 (visa.M/C only) 
800-672-3470 ext 844 (in CA) 

415-962-1279 Info. POs. Support 


WORD IMAGE 

The WP/editor lor you! Key macros, command 
or menu driven, undelete, full color, math, mail 
merge. DOS sheli. edits 4 large files, batch files, 
extensive search/re;^ options, help, all print- 
ers. indexed manual with tutonal. PLUS MUCH 
MORE Needs 384K. PCOOS 2.0+ . and 2 drives 
$6500+$5S&H. 30-Day trial 
SOFTWARE IDEOLOGY 
PO, Box 305 
Brooklyn, NY. 11204 
(718)236-3876 


MAXTHINK— EDITORS' CHOICE! 

Comparison reviews PC-Magazme. PC-World. 
PC-Week. and Byte say MaxThink is today's most 
powerful text/outline processor. Faster for or- 
ganizing Ideas and actions— links to all word 
processors. Easy to learn and use with on-line 
screen helps Invaluable to writers, managers, 
planners, consultants, thinkers. $89 
MAXTHINK IDEA/OUTLINE PROCESSOR 
230 Crocker Avenue #2 
Piedmont. CA 94610 
(800) 227-1590 (US) 800 642-2406 (CA) 



and save 50% 


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IF YOU ARE A 
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P R O D f C T I \’ I T >■ 


■ CHARLES PETZOLD 


PC TUTOR 



Our imaginative expert finds a Nordic solution to directory-sorting problems, sets up a 
resident form-feed program, and gives you the lowdown on NEC V20 compatibility. 


RESIDENT FORM-FEED PROGRAM 

I’d like to have a memory-resident pro- 
gram that provides a printer form-feed key 
on the PC keyboard. This would use a key- 
stroke combination such as Alt-PrtSc. It 
would appear from some other ipsident 
programs I've seen in PC Tutor that such a 
program should not be too long. 

L. R, Holliday 

Ponca City, Oklahoma 


N FORNPEED.COH 
A 


JMP 

tl3t 

) Junp to inlt 

DM 

*.* 


STI 


1 New Int. 9 

rasa 

AX 


IN 

AL,6I 

I Get key 

CMP 

AL,37 

1 See if PrtSc 

JNX 

812A 


MOV 

AHrSI 

1 Check foe Alt 

INT 

1« 


TEST 

AL.IB 


JX 

012A 


FU8B 

OX 


NOV 

OX, BBSS 

; Check printer 

NOV 

M1,B2 

> status 

INT 

17 


TEST 

AH,8B 


JZ 

B129 


MOV 

AL,BC 

; Print formfeed 

NOV 

ANrBB 


INT 

17 


POP 

OX 


POP 

AX 


CSi 

JNP 

PAR (B1B2] 

f Run old Int. 9 

NOV 

AX,35B9 

; Initt save 

INT 

21 

t Int. 9 

NOV 

(B1B2] .BX 


NOV 

IB1B4] ,ES 


NOV 

0X,B1B6 

I Set new 

NOV 

AX,2SB9 

1 Int. 9 

INT 

21 


NOV 

DX.B13B 


INT 

27 

1 Terminate 


R CX 

4A 

H 

0 


Figure 1 : This DEBUG script file 
FORMFEED.SCR wilt create 
FORMFEED . COM, a resident program that 
sends a form-feed to your printer when you 
press Alt-PrtSc. 


It's not long at alt. The necessary program 
is shown in Figure I in the form of a DE- 
BUG script. You can either load DEBUG 
and type the lines as shown, or you can 
type the lines into a file called FORM- 
FEED.SCR and run 

DEBUG <FORMFEED.SCR 

Be sure to include the blank line (that is. a 
carriage return by itself) shown near the 
bottom. 

The FORMFEED .COM file created by 
DEBUG is the resident program. As you 
suggested, it uses Alt-PrtSc. Note that 
FORMFEED.COM does not dear the 
keystroke from the keyboard hardware but 
just branches to the previous Interrupt 9 
keyboard handler after it's done. Thus, if 
you had FORMFEED twice, you'll get 
two form-feeds with an Alt-PrtSc. 

Before writing the form-feed character 
(a he.x (Kh) out to the printer, FORM- 
FEED does a printer status call to Inter- 
rupt I7h. so it doesn't hang if the printer is 
off-line. 


SORTING THE DIRECTORV BY DATE 

The most useful way to display a directory 
is chronologically by date, with the most 
recently created or modified files at the 
bottom. Tom Sheldon’s article on batch 
files in PC Lab Notes (PC Magazine, Vol- 
ume 5 Number 6) showed a number of 
ways to do this with piping using the 
SORT filter, but the examples are flawed 
because the date in a DIR listing is dis- 
played in month-day-year format. You 
would need year-monih-day format for 
sorting. Including the time field would be 


useful, too, but that’s complicated by the 
use of an A. M. andP.M. identifier instead 
of a 24-hour clock. 

I’ve been using a commercial sort utili- 
ty to do a directory the way I like, but it 
seems like overkill. Is there some way to 
get DOS to do it right? 

Michael Lampton 
Berkeley, California 

There is if you have PC-DOS 3.0 or 3.1 . 
These DOS versions contain internai ta- 
bles that embody foreign-country informa- 
tion. including date formats, time formats, 
currency symbols, decimal separators, 
etc. This information is available for pro- 
grams to use through DOS calls. Although 
most programs don't take advantage of 
this facility (it's not available in DOS2.\). 
the programs and commands included 
with DOS 3.x — such as DIR — alter their 
date and time displays to those of the coun- 
try currently set. 

You can make DOS believe it's in a dif- 
ferent country simply by including a line in 
your CONFIG. SYS fde. (This ise.xplained 
in the chapter ' 'Configuring Your System" 
in the DOS numual.) Of the supported 
countries, only good old Sweden uses the 
year-month-day format. So, your CON- 
FIG.SYS fde could have the line 

COUNTRY=046 

The 046 is the code for Sweden. The num- 
bers DOS uses are the international tele- 
phone system country codes. 

Reboot with the CONFIG.SYS file in 
the root directory of your hoot drive and do 
a DIR: it will look a little different, but the 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST IVSC 
439 



PRODUCTIVITY 


■ PC TUTOR 


date and time will be exactly the way you 
need to have them to run a sort by year, 
then by months and days. Now you can set 
up the batch file Tom Sheldon suggests 
with the line 


DIR I SORT /+24 

and you’ll get a true date sort. 

One problem with this procedure is that 
you may someday encounter an applica- 


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PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 19 
440 


tions program that insists on using the 
Swedish kroner symbol instead of a dollar 
sign, since DOS continues to use country 
information you set with CONFIG.SYS 
and so believes it’s in Sweden. If you’d 
rather not spend all your DOS days in 
Sweden, you can remove the COUNTRY 
line from your CONFIG.SYS file and use a 
couple of short programs to change the 
country as you wish. These programs will 
let you fly to Sweden and back again real 
quick. Figure 2 shows \ou how to use DE- 
BUG to make a SWEDEN.COM file. Fig- 
ure 3 shows the USA.COM file. Your 
batch file would now look like this: 

SWEDEN 

DIR \ SORT /+24 

USA 

The value of the AL register in these pro- 
grams is the same as the country code used 
in the CONFIG. SYS COUNTRY statement 
but e.xpressed in hexadecimal rather than 
decimal numbers. 


THE V20 AND THE 8087 
I have an IBM PC with an 8087 coproces- 
sor chip installed. Will I get a further in- 

DEBOG 

-N af EDEN. COM 
-A 

2C7A:tl08 MOV DXyPFFP 
2C7Aifll3 NOV AL,2B 
2C7Atflf5 MOV AHa38 
2C7Ai81«7 INT 21 
2C7Atfll9 INT 2 $ 

2C7A$I10B 
-R CX 
CX 0000 
iB 
“W 

Writing 000B bytes 

-Q 

Figure 2: This DEBUG session creates a 
SWEDEN .COM program. When it’ s run under 
PC-DOS3.0or3.1, the date format used by 
DOS will be in YY-MM-DD format and the time 
will use a 24-hour clock. 


DEBUG 

-H USA.COM 
-A 

2C7A>0100 NOV DXyPPFF 
2C7AI0103 NOV AL,01 
2C7AI0105 MOV AB,38 
2C7A$0107 IHT 21 
2C7AI0109 INT 20 
2C7A:010B 
-R CX 
CX 0000 
tB 

-w 

Writing 000B bytes 


Figure 3: This DEBUG session creates a 
USA.COM program that tells PC-DOS 3.0 or 
3.1 to display the dates and times in U.S. 
format. 

6 


PRODUCTIVITY 


crease in speed by substituting a NEC V20 
chip for my 8088? The PC Magazine arti- 
cle in Volume 4 Number 26 about the V20 
(“Turbocharging your PC with the V-Se- 
ries") did not mention anything about 
8087 compatibility. Is the V20 compatible 
with the 8087? 

John R. Day 

Cupertino, California 

The SEC V20 pm essor is definitely com- 
patible with the Intel 8087 math coproces- 
sor. (It is so compatible, in fact, that Intel 
is currently suing SEC for patent infringe- 


■ While the V20 will 
boost the speed of much 
8088 processor work, it 
will not significantly 
increase the speed of 
floating-point 
calculations. 


menl.) Bui while the V20 will h(H)si the 
speed of much B0H8 pnK'essor work, it will 
not significantly increase the speed of 
floating-point calculations done b\ the 
8087. 

For readers unfamiliar with these 
chips, here's a fast rundown: The 8087 is a 
floating-point math copriK essor chip that 
you can install in the empty sm ket next to 
the 8088 microproc essor on the system 
board of PCs, XTs, atui many compati- 
bles. (Exceptions are the PCjr, which has 
no empty socket, and the PC AT, which re- 
quires the 80287 math coprocessor chip 
instead of an 8087). Many statistical and 
math packages support an 8087, and other 
software is gradually coming around also. 
For instance, while 1-2-3, Relea.se I A, 
cannot use an 8087, Release 2 checks to 
see if an 8087 has been installed and uses it 
if present. 

With tight and efficient 1^87 code, the 
8087 enables a program to do floating- 
point calculations about 50 to l(X) times 


faster than equivalent a.s.sembly language 
routines. When using the Microsoft com- 
pilers (C, FORTRAN. Pascal) that sup- 
port the 8087, you can e.xpect flcHiting- 
point calculations to go about 30 times 
faster than the ' ‘8087 emulation ’ routines 
these compilers have to u.se for non-8087 
machines. A Lotus 1-2-3, Release 2. 
spread.sheet heavy with flmiting-point cal- 
culations will recalculate about 10 times 
faster with an 8087. Obviously, it has to do 
a lot more than just the calculations. 

The 80287 chip installed in an AT does 
not provide the .same degree of improve- 
ment. To learn why, check out the special 
Fall 1985 i.s.sue of Byte. "Inside the IBM 
PCs, ' ’ which has a very interesing article 
by MicroWay s Steve Fried on the com- 
ple.xities of measuring 8087 and 80287 
performance. 

The NEC V20 chip is a direct substitute 
for the Intel 8088 microprw es.sor in PCs 
and XTs. Just poftthe 8088 out and stick 
the V20 in. [If you've never practiced re- 
moving and installing integrated cir- 
cuits — by stuffing the sockets on an un- 
filled memory-expansion board, for exam- 
ple — replacing a 40-pin microprocessor is 
probably not the place to start learning. 
Enlist the help of a more experienced 
friend or serviceman. — Ed.) The V20 pro- 
vides a slightly enhanced instruction set 
( which PC .software developers will proba- 
bly ignore), corrects at least one 8088 
hug, and. mo.st important, e.xecutes many 
8088 machine-language instructions fast- 
er— particularly those that take longest on 
the 8088, .such as multiply and divide. 
Overall, you’ll probably get about a 5 to 
10 percent proce.ssor .speed irnprovemetu 
with a V20. 

Note, however, that you probably 
won't get significantly fa.ster .screen writ- 
ing on a color ! graphics display, .since pro- 
grams must still wait for horizontal retrace 
before writing to the screen. 

Users of The Norton Utilities should be 
skeptical of the 1 .8 "performance inde.x" 
that SYSINFO reports for the V20. Nor- 
ton's program involves looping around a 
couple of IMUL and IDIV instructions. 
These instructions are very slow in the 
8088. Other microprocessors (including 
the NEC V20, the 8018618, and the 80286) 
will run them much faster. The SYSINFO 
index .should always be interpreted as re- 


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CIRCLE 342 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
441 



P R () 1) U C I I V 1 T Y 


■ PC TUTOR 


poriin^ an upjwr limit rather than an aver- 
afie measure of performance improve- 
ment. 

If Poatinfi’point calculations are your 
main concern, a V20 will not do much for 


you. Usin^ the Microsoft C Compiler 
3.(X). I found that Jltniting point calcula- 
tions done hy the Microsoft emulation .soft- 
ware without usin^ an H0H7 improve hy 
about 15 percent when a V20 replaces the 


a^Reviews in brief 

"iirinhCool: Keeping Your 
PC frm Overtmling 


BY JIM FORNEY 


After years of slaving over hot 
circuitry, my faithful, overloaded IBM 
PC is running at least 1 5 degrees cooler 
these days thanks to an add-on cooling 
fan called Turbo-Cool from PC Cooling 
Systems. Turbo-Cool (formerly known 
as “Silencer, model HP”) bolls onto the 
back of the PC over the power supply's 
exhaust grill, drawing up to 100 percent 
more air through the unit. 

Prior to installing the Turbo-Cool, 1 
measured a 30-degree temperature rise 
above ambient room temperature with 
a temperature probe positioned just 
above the motherboard and tucked in 
between two expansion boards. With 
Turbo-Cool installed and the temp- 
erature probe in the same location, the 
temperature rise was cut exactly in 
half — a mere 1 5 degrees hotter than my 
room — and the top of the PC’s cabinet 
was significantly cooler to the touch at 
the hottest point (just above the location 
of the probe). Although “Silencer”— the 
name under which it was originally 
marketed — was a misnomer, Turbo- 
Cool's fan is much quieter than IBM's 
built-in cooling fan. In fact, there is no 
significant increase in the noise level 
with Turbo-Cool running. 

Installation couldn't be easier, as it 
does not require going inside your 
computer at all. To install Turbo-Cool 
on a PC or XT, all you have to do is 
remove four screws from the back panel 
that secure the power supply in place. 
Then you simply attach the fan unit by 
inserting the longer screws supplied 
with it back into the same holes. The 
Turbo-Cool unit is just 3 inches thick 
and adds that much to the depth of a PC 


when installed, but in terms of required 
clearance behind the CPU, it doesn't 
add much beyond what you would 
normally leave to prevent kinking all 
those connecting cables anyway. 

The fan is supplied with a “Y” power 
cable, one end of which plugs into the 
monitor outlet on the back of the 
computer so that Turbo-Cool turns on 
automatically when you start your 
system. The other end of the Y has a 
monitor receptacle similar to the one 
that the fan has taken, so none of the 
original functionality is lost. 

I’ve overheated my computer more 
than once, especially in hot weather. 
Heat can be a major problem and can 
cause all manner of strange things to 
happen, as well as shortening the lifespan 
of all those expensive plug-in boards 
and gizmos you’ve added to your system. 
This looks like it's about as slick a way 
to keep the bugs away on a hot night as 
any I've seen. ■ 



Turbo-Cool 
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(619) 723-9513 
Price: $69.95 (PC or XT) 
$79.95 (AT) 

Terras: VISA/ MC/ COD/ PC's 


The (ext is reprinted (unedited and unabridged) from PC* 
Magazine March 25. 1986. Copyright ^ 1986 Ziff'IHvis 
Publishing Co. 


aOfili. However, N087 JliHiling-poim eal- 
cuhliom with a V20 anti 8087 are oniy 
about 2 percent faster than the 8088/8087 
combination. Why is this'.’ Simple: the em- 
ulation routines u.se a lot of multiply and 
divide instructions that are significantly 
improved hy the V20. When the 8087 is 
used for fliHiting-point calculations, these 
8088 instructions don't have to he used as 
e.stensively. Hence, the speed improve- 
ment is negligible. 

Still. I have not yet heard about any 
problems with the V20 chip. Considering 
that it’s very ine.xpensive (about $2S). it's 
probably worthwhile in any case to 
squeeze out an extra few percent of perfor- 
mance improvement from your PC or XT. 


THE V20 AND THE PCjr 

I was very interested in the article on NEC 
V-serics microprocessor replacement 
chips, in PC Magazine Volume 4 Number 
26 ("Turtxx.harging Your PC with the V- 
Scrics”). Nothing was mentioned about 
the PCjr, however. Would the NEC V20 
increase the speed of my jf. 1 know that the 
PCjr has a .soldercd-in 8088. but 1 can sol- 
der and feel comfortable replacing it. 
Would it be worth the effort? 

Alfred Bottner 

Baltimore. Maryland 

No. Soldering in the V20 is the easy part. 
Removing the e.xisting 40-pin 8088 would 
he murder without the right tools. 

Although I .said above that the 5 to 10 
percent .speed improvement provided hy 
the NEC V20 is worth the co.st of the chip, I 
btised that conclusion only on results from 
benchmark programs that / .saw on my 
screen. I cannot otherwise perceive the 
.speed improvement that a V20 is giving 
me. Without running the benchmark pro- 
grams. I would not he able to gue.s.s that a 
PC had a V20 instead of an 8088 just by 
using the machine. I would not attack a 
PCjr .system board with a .soldering iron 
for a speed increa.se that I could not actu- 
ally feel. 


ASK THE PC TUTOR 

The PC Tutor solves practical problems 
and explains points of general interest. To 
sec your questions answered here, drop a 
line to PC Tutor. PC Magazine. One Park 
Avenue. New York. NY 10016. Iffl 


PC MAOAZINt; ■ ALIOU.ST 1986 
442 


PC PRODUCT INDEX 





















AMT — The PC Ultimate 



AMT-286 
IBM PC/AT 
COMPATIBLE LOWEST 
PRICED UNIT 
ON THE MARKET. 

80826 MICRO- 
PROCESSOR WITH 
8MHZ CLOCK MAKES 
IT 33% FASTER 
THAN IBM WHILE 
MAINTAINING THE 
COMPATIBILITY. 
FCC APPROVED & 
MADE IN U.S.A. 


640KB Memory on the 
Mother Board, 8 IBM 
Compatible Slots, Clock with 
battery back-up. Western 
Digital Controller, 1.2MB 
Disk Drive. 


$1399 


"O" Wait State Option Add $300 


TOTAL SOLUTIONS WITH ADVANCED DESIGN 


= Jf ATjr faster than any Turbo 
XT on the market, 8088-2 or V-20 CPU, 8 MHZ 
Clock (switchable 8 to 4.77 MHZ), 640 KB Memory 
on Board, Floppy Controller, Two 360 KB Disk 
Drives, 135 Watts Power Supply, 8 XT compati- 
ble slots, AT style keyboard, socket for 8087, LED 
Indicator for Turbo Mode, high speed DMA 
Transfer of 1.6 MB per second, complete system 
FCC approved. 


CIRCLE 507 ON READER SERVICE CARD 



LAP TOP PC 8088 CPU, IBM PC Compatible, weighs 
only 10 pounds, 360 KB Disk Drive, 512 KB Memory, 
Keyboard, 7 hour rechargeable battery, room for second drive, 
80 X 25 Display. 

$ 1199.00 


DEALERS CORNER (Oty. Only) 

8MHZ Turbo XT Mother Board 640K Version "0” K $139 

AT Style Keyboard $ 59 

XT Power Supply $ 59 

AT Power Supply $109 


20 MB HARD DISK SUBSYSTEM $399.00 (Limited Quantity) 


THE PRICE PERFORMANCE LEADER 

AMERICAN MICRO TECHNOLOGY 

14751-B Franklin Ave., Tustin, CA 92680 
(714) 972-2945 / TWX 5106003265 AMT USA 

Price & Availability subject to change without notice. Above prices are for COD purchase. 


NORTHERN CALIFORNIA 
(415)'490-7967 
SERVICE 
(714) 667-5116 
LOS ANGELES SALES 
(213) 477-6320 







BUSINESS COMPUTERS 

OF PETERBOROUGH Gollan Co., Inc. 

Upper Union St. P.O. Box 94 
W. Peterborough, NH 03468-0094 


'^^On e price , free freight, 
in strtek, and that's 


muarn F. Gollan 
President 


mY pmmise: 


“We’ll support, service, and warranty everything we sell and stand behind it 100%.' 





‘ io MB ry. r. ■ ■ . ." ■ ! ■". .. . -169.001 


I AT* I o.-'t*-- 


fMt \ HrilNOtlLl.l BOX 

»j« tu ■ »-' lUlh ( Ifrrf 
M;i ./>• .i-M. IVltPj tai'i. 


I 44-».0^)l 
. . . . . .i-rtv.ij 


l^lxPak f’lutiM tS ■ 


THE BOTTOM LINE 


I Hit wrwuy /-Stth 


,P(. Sft 1$ ( ttrtl 


> :-H 



The bottom line is that nobody offers lower prices or better service on all computer hardware, 
software and peripherals than Micro-Mail. For the best deals in America call us. 


Toll Free 
Out-Of-State 

1 - 800 - 634-4884 



Monday-Friday, 9AM • 6PM EST. 


In New Jersey Call 

( 201 ) 370-4800 


CIRCLE 202 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




Coming up 


ACCELERATOR BOARDS In com- 
puting, slow and steady doesn't win the 
race — it’s pure speed that measures a ma- 
chine’s productivity. With AT speeds 
blazing new standards, your PC or XT 
probably seems unbearably slow or almost 
obsolete in comparison. The answer? Tur- 
bocharge your machine with an accelerator 
card and watch it take off. PC Magazine 
Labs times and tests a wide variety of turbo 
boards, from inexpensive “no-slot” giz- 
mos to huge expansion boards that almost 
place another computer inside your famil- 
iar hardware. 

BACKUP POWER: WHEN THE 
JUICE STOPS FLOWING The stand 
by power system (SPS) and the uninterrup- 
tible power system (UPS) both keep you 
running when the power fails. To prevent 
data wipeouts and disk damage, SPS and 
UPS systems use batteries that store back- 
up electrical energy, but an SPS system 
switches over to that supply when the pow- 
er company fails. A UPS system, on the 
other hand, uses its battery continuously. 
Winn L. Rosch reviews a crop of backup 
systems and gives pointers on how to se- 
lect the best system for your computing 
needs. 

SECURITY: PROTECTING YOUR 
HARD DISK FROM PRYING EYES 

Almost commonplace, PCs sit atop desks 
all across America — stuffed with tempting 
strategic information. How do you keep 
nosy intruders from peeking at your hard 
disk — even when you're sharing it? Jared 
Taylor reviews four programs that encrypt 
files and set up elaborate security systems. 
Some even offer DOS shells and e-mail 
systems. 

9,600-BIT-PER-SECOND MODEMS 

Just when you thought 2.400-bps modems 
were speedy, technology broke the baud 
barrier with 9.6(X) bps. Although not yet a 
standard, these modems excel at PC-to-PC 
communication. Sii 



It's frustrating. You need all sorts of forms to 
run your business— but your word processor 
can’t draw lines and your graphics program 
won't write. Now FormWonf lets you create 
professional-looking business forms In minufes 
right on your PC— no pens, no rulers, no 
headache! 

Design forms. Easily. Choose from a variety of 
lines, symbols, and ^pe sizes (including com- 
pressed type on most printers) to create custom 
forms or modify exisbng ones (up to 11 " x 14'^. 

Fill out forms. Perfectly. Fill out custom or 
even pre-printed forms without accidentally 
crossing a line, using text edibng features like 
on-screen underlining, bold facing, jusllflcatlon, 
and automatic word-wrap. Powerful macros let 
you insert "boiler-plate" text, jump from one 
blank to another, and more. 

Print the whole form. Or just the data. On any 
of nearly 100 printers, including HP LaserJet. 


Special Ofterl For just $95* you get the com- 
plete FormWorx system (Including MonoGrafx. 
JetWorx. and Replay! software), sample forms, 
and superb manual with tutorials. Plus free 
telephone support. So order today using Visa. 
MC. or check. Call 

1 - 800 - 992-0085 

(in Mass. 617-641-0400) 

‘Includes normal shipping and handling. Add 
$5 for foreign, COO. and purchase orders. 
Optional character editor for designing special 
symbols $35 extra. 

Analytx International, Inc. 

.^1= 1365 Massachusetts Avenue 
S. Adington. MA 02174 


Requirements: IBM PC witti 320KB and DOS 2.0 or higher. FormWon, MonoGratx, JetWorx, arxJ Replayt are trademarks of 
Analylx Inc 


SofType* 

Desktop Publishing Software 


PC EXPO 
BOOTH #2242 



Gives MULTIMATE' 
Users The Extra 
ADVANTAGE! 

WordPerfect, Samoa 
Word, Display write and 
LEX users too. 


• SorXype automatically turns your word processing 
documents into typeset output 


• SorXype works with most laser printers. 


• SofType includes many Roman and Helv normal, 
bold, italics and bold italics fonts from 6 to 36 
points in size. 


• SofType lets you integrate graphics with text 

• SofType costs only $1,000 for your PC or $1,500 
for your multi-user computer. 

SofTest Inc. 


555 Goff le Road. Ridgewood, N J. 07450 
Phone (800) 445-9292, Telex 703593 

T(iatai4k»; SoITtm ky SoITgit IM.. HtinUiU Igt. Ik.. SiMt Void ky Smwi Cory., DHfltyvilIt by 
I8H. WoidPtfltelby VgttfbgiitciCorr, lidy ACEUitiemitm Ltd 


ORCLE 498 ON READER SERVICE CARD 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
447 

























inriington ©>mputer Product/ 
be/t price/ on IBID PC/. . . 


IBM PC 


2 Drives, 256K 
Monochrome Monitor 
2 Drives. 256K, 

Color Monitor 
2 Drives. 256K, w/IOMB 
Monochrome Monitor 


$1425 
$1649 
$ 1799 y 


IBM XT 

1 Drive. 640K, 

20 MB Hard Disk, 

Monochrome Monitor $2349 

1 Drive, 640K, 

20 MB Hard Disk. 

Color Monitor $2575 


. . .and COMPAQ too! 

I COMPAQ DESK PRO 

1 Drive, 640K w/20 MB 
COMPAQ Monitor $2349 

1 Drive. 256K w/20 MB $1999 


COMPAQ 286 


DESKTOP — 1 Drive, 256K PORTABLE — 1 Drive, 

w/30 MB, COMPAQ Monitor S4 795 256K, 20 MB Hard Disk $4195 


COMPAQ PORTABLE 

2 Drives. 256K $1595 


give/ you the 

IBM AT ^ 



1.2 Floppy. 512K, 

20 MB Hard Disk, 
Monochrome Monitor 
1.2 Floppy. 512K, 

20 MB Hard Disk. 
Color Monitor 


$3899 


BOARDS 


HERCULES 

GRAPHICS CARD $285 

HERCULES COLOR CARD . $139 

SIGMA COLOR 400 S419 

PERSYST -BOB" $329 

STB CHAUFFER S249 

QUADRAM EGA $379 

AST ADVANTAGE W/128 K . $349 

AST RAMPAGE $269 

AST RAMPAGE AT $399 

INTEL ABOVE BOARD .... CALL 
ORCHID PC TURBO 

W/DAUGHTERBOARD $499 

AST 5251-11 $569 


MODEMS 

HAYES 1200 $363 

HAYES 1200B ALONE $279 

HAYES 1200B W/SOFTWARE $335 
HAYES 2400 $565 


MONITORS 

AMDEK PRINCETON 

310A $145 MAX 12... $159 

600 $399 HX12E.... $505 

722 $505 SRI 2 $565 

QUADRAM 

QUADCHROME CALL 

NEC MULTISYNC $549 


t^issue highlights^ 

AST 6 PACK EVBREX EVEREX 

PLUS 384K THE EDGE GRAPHICS EDGE 

$199 $219 $239 


HERCULES 
COMPATIBLE 
COLOR CARD 

$69 

EVEREX 300/7200 
INTERNAL MODEM 
W/SOFTWARE 


HERCULES 
COMPATIBLE 
GRAPHICS CARD 

$105 

SEAGATE 
20MB KIT 
FOR PC/XT 


PRINCETON 
HX12 MONITOR 
(incl. cable) 

$415 

PC MOUSE 
W/DR. HALO II 


r 


PRINTERS 




EPSON 


LX 80 ... . $239 LQ 800 .. . $525 
LX 90.... $259 LQ1000..$639 

FX 85 .... $349 DX 20.... $319 
FX 286 .. . $499 DX 35 . . . . $619 

OKIDATA 

ML192 IBM $339 

ML193 IBM $475 

84 IBM $635 


TOSHIBA 


$165 $419 

V 



321 . . . 
341 ... 
351 P . . 
351 P/S 


. $515 
. $795 
. $995 
CALL 


SOFTWARE 


WORDPERFECT 4.1 ..$199 

WORDSTAR 2000 $229 

WORDSTAR 2000+ .... $279 

WORDSTAR PRO $239 

MULTIMATE $205 

MULTIMATE ADV $245 

VOLKSWRITER III .... $145 
TURBO LIGHTENING. $ 59 

R BASE 5000 $319 

REVELATION $499 


V 


D BASE III PLUS $409 

FRAMEWORK $389 

ENABLE $329 

LOTUS 123 $325 

SYMPHONY $429 

HARVARD TOTAL 
PROJECT MGR .... $255 

SMARTCOM II $ 79 

CROSSTALK $ 95 

NORTON UTIL $ 59 


y 


NEC 


P5 $1149 

P6 $475 

P7 $595 


PANASONIC 

1091 $269 

1092 $339 

SILVER-REED 

EXP 800 $669 

IBM 

PROPRINTER $409 

V > 


Arlington 

C>mputer 


roduct/.inc. 


4S0 E. HIGGINS ROAD 

ELK GROVE VILLAGE. IL 60007 



FOR ORDERS a SYSTEMS QUOTES: 


800 - 548-5105 


CUSTOMER SERVICE AND IN ILLINOIS CALL 312-228.6333 


Prices and Availability Subject To Change Without Notice 

- . .J 



COMPUTER DISCOUNT WAREHOUSE 


Ci' 


IBM XT SPECIAL 

w/1 FLOPPY. 2S6K. 30 MEG S22M.44 

IBM PC " 

w/1 FLOPPY. 64K SI 258.40 

FLOPPIES. 64K 81358.40 

W l FLOPPY. 64K. 1 10 MEG 81658.40 
w 1 FLOPPY. 54K. 20 MEG 81820.44 


WHY PAY 
RETAIL? 


amfwr 

PORTABLE 



2DRIVE2S6K 81543.69 

1 DRIVE + 1 10 MEG 81973.50 

1 DRIVE + 1 20 MEG ... 82097.57 
COtPAO POMTAM E$ wauOC WSOOS 


Nobody Sells zee s . PORJABLE^M^ DESK PRO S 

for less 


HARDWARE, SOFTWARE & PERIPHERALS AT WSCOUHT PRICES 


ALL IN STOCK 
CALL FOR LOWEST CUSTOM QUOTES 

TIKtofliilfd trsasmsrk of IBM sntf COMPAQ 


IBM PC/XT- SPECIALS 

IBM PC w 64K 1 dfive $1250.40 

IBM PC w 64K 2 drives 1358.40 

IBM PC W&4K1 floppy 1 10 meg hard 1658.40 

IBM PC w &4K 1 fio^ 1 20 rneg hard 1820.44 

IBM XTw256K 1 drive 1609.53 

IBM XT w 256K 2 drives 1707.31 

IBM XT w 256K 1 floppy arxJ 10 meg 1999.43 

IBM XT w 256K 1 floppy and 20 meg 2099.54 

IBM XT w 256K 1 floppy and 30 meg 2260.44 

IBM AT' SPECIALS 

IBM AT W256K 1.2 meg floppy $2977.07 

IBM AT w 256K 20 meg hard dnve 3571 .07 

IBM AT w512K 20 meg hard dnve 3629.39 

IBM AT w SI 2K 30 meg hard drive 3843.47 

iBM AT w 512X '0 meg riaio dnve 4893,96 

eomPM' SPECIALS 

COMPAQ ponat}fewi28Ki floppy $1473.50 

COMPAQ portaCWe w 2S6K 2 floppies 1543 69 

COMPAQ portable w 256K i floppy and 10 meg 1973.50 
COMPAQ DeskPro w 128K 1 floppy 1532.96 

COMPAQ DeskPro w 256K 2 floppies 1674.26 

COMPAQ DeskPro w 640K 20 meg hard drive 1961.96 
COMPAQ DeskPro «v 640K 30 meg hard dnve 21 1 1 .94 
Call lor lowes) custom quotes on 
COMPAQ ■286' and the an new 
COMPAQ PORTABLE II m stock now $AVE 

JaTAT SPECIALS 
AT&T 6300 w 128K 1 dnve & keyboard $1368.50 

AT&T 6300 w 256K 2 dnves & keyboard . SAVE 

AT&T 6300 w 256K i floppy 20 meg 1974.23 

AT&T 6300Pyj^T compatible) SAVE 

CCTB ’ PC SPECIALS 
2 Drive Ponwe |18 ib IBM PC compaiibiei $1341.93 

1 2 height dnve $96.00 

IBM Logo Dnve 123.16 

TANDON full height floppy dnve 99.87 

SEAGATE 10 meg 1 2 height hard dnve SAVE 

SEAGATE 20 meg 1 2 height hard dnve SAVE 

XEBEC 10 meg 1 2 height hard dnve , 387.54. 

GENOA 20 meg internal tape 693.43 

GENOA 20 meg external tape 818.76 

GENOA 60 meg tape drives CALL 

IOMEGA rentable hard drives systems Prom 1754.23 
IRWIN 10 meg lape backup 465.00 


TALLGRASS technology Products 

CALL 

1 DRIVE CARDS 1 

MOUNTAIN 20 meg 

$603.33 

M(3UNTAIN 30 meg 

SAVE 

MAYNARD 10 meg 

596.23 

MAYNARD 20 meg 

683.45 

WESTERN DIGITAL 10 and 20 meo 

CALL 

OTHER DRIVE CARDS AVAIUBLE UPON REQUEST 


MOST ORDERS SHIPPED 
WITHIN 48 HOURS. 


TAPES AND DRIVES FOR IBM ATs 


20 meg hard disk SEAGATE or RODIME $557.80 

30 meg hard disk SEAGATE or RODIME 687.51 

70 meg hard disk 1695.69 

360K floppy drive 110.12 

GENOA io meg internal tape 693.43 

GENOA 20 meg external tape 818.76 

EPSON LX 80 80 Cot 100 CPS HLQ STD $232.61 
EPSON flX too Plus 

132 Col 100 CPS Tractor Sid 299.56 

EPSON FX 65 SAVE 

EPSON FX 286 517.00 

EPSON LO 600 . 543.22 

EPSON LO 1000 673.43 

EPSON COMREX 420 132 Col 420 CPS 999.11 

IBM Pro Printer 429.40 

NEC P6 60 col 475.22 

NEC P7 136 cd 216 cps 615.35 

NECP5136col290cpS 999.67 

NEC 3550 Spinwriter 797.12 

NEC 8850 Spinwi te- 1127.65 

OKIok«mate20 117.72 

OKI ML 162 221.40 

OKI ML 183 ... 363.00 

OKI ML 192 . . 359.84 

OKI ML 193 499.21 

TOSHIBA P321 509.63 

TOSHIBA P341 SAVE 

TOSHIBA P351 Parallel Version $999.99 


LASER PRINTERS 


CORONA Laser Pnnier $2223.24 

H P Laser Jet Pnnier . , 2376.00 

H-P Las er Jet Plus 3 023.24 

HAYES 300 Smart Modem $136.08 

HAYES 1200B . . 299.39 

HAYES 1 2006 w Smartcom 334.89 

HAYES 12008 1 2 Caro - New Release SAVE 

HAYES 1200 392.08 

HAYES 2400 622.06 

HAYES 2400B mlemal . . 502.16 


COLOR GRAPHIC MONITORS 


AMDEK color 600 |Hi-Res RGB) $399.97 

AM0EKcoky722 SAVE 

AMOEK color 725 SAVE 

IBM color monitor 528.77 

PQS HX-12 Hi-Resolution RGB 412.32 

PGS HX-12E Hi Reso<uton RGB 484,32 

PGS SR-12 enhanced graphics capability 583.20 

QUAD Chrome II Color 3S4.20 


ENHANCED GRAPHICS PRODUCTS (EGA) 


$343.75 
679.41 
484.32 
397 73 
322.85 


GENOA SPECTRA EGA 256K w p 
IBM enhanced graphics monitor 
PGS HX-12E Hi-Resduuon 
QUAORAM EGA 
STB EGA PLUS 256K w p 


INTERFACE CARDS A 
MULTI FUNCTION CARDS 


APPARAT 384K w Clock bfe Time Warranty 
AST 6 pack with 64K C S P expands to 384K 
AST advantage lor AT expands to 3 meg 
AST 1 0 mini (dock serial p 
OlGlGRAPHKi 


MONOCHROME MONITORS 


AMOEK 310A $140.40 

C(DMPAQ monochrome monitor (green or amber) 16L46 

IBM monochrome monitor 219A4 

PGS MAX 126 amber color . . 167.40 

(3UA0RAM Amber Chrome 144.10 


MONITOR INTERFACE CAROS 


GENOA Spedrum (color monographc w p) $259.39 
HERCULES cotof card w p 144.16 

HERCULES monographic w p 274.93 

PERSYST short port color card w parallel port 137.57 
PERSYST short port mono card w parallel port 1 34.69 
OUADRAM Gold Quad Board w 64K color P C 387.33 
STB Chauffeur w d 237 BO 


Call CDW for custom quotes 
on products not listed. 


expands to 3&4 k w OK C 
INTEL above board for PC w 64K 
INTEL above board for AT w 128K 
JRAM-3 w 256K (Lotus 2.0 Symphony 
compatibiei 
Paraild port ... . 

OUADRAM Liberty w 64K 
QUAORAM Silver Quad Board expands to 640K 
wPSCGOK 

OUADRAM Quad Board expands to 364K 
wPSCGOK 

Serai port . .. 


4164 (64K 150 nanoseconds) 

Nine Chip Set (cornpiele set) 

126K piggy backs (or AT 

Nine Chip Set (cornpiele set) 

8087-3 I'Of PC XT COMPAQ portabiei . 
9087-2 (for COMPAQ DeskPro) 

80287-2 (for AT and AT compatibles) 

41 256K (2S6K chips) 

Nine Chip Sel (complete set) 


MISC. & ACCESSORIES 


A-B Switching Box (par or serial) 

BASED SOD 

BASF 3.5' Disk for MACINTOSH 10 pack 
Di^s lor AT (1 2 megi 
KENSINGTf^ Master Piece 
KEVTRONICS 5150 
KEYTRONICS5151 
Printer Cable lor IBM 
OUADRAM MICRO FAZERS 
XT Power Sunnfv 


$199.89 

166.24 

397.65 

125.28 

11490 

297.76 

396.36 

264.90 

69.80 

245.41 


189.71 

49.95 

$2.00 

9.98 

4.00 

34.50 

121.50 

14943 

16849 

4.00 

28.12 


$45.00 

12.50 

19.99 
26.14 

99.99 
108.00 
162.00 

19.99 
140.40 


If you find a better price 
We’ll meet it or beat it. 


WHY WAIT? CALL COMPUTER DISCOUNT WAREHOUSE NOW! 


SPECIAL! 
LOTUS 123 
S299.00 


1-(800) 233-4426 


•r StOO 00 piNS* KM 
M A> pncrt '•daci panonai ' 
uh Allow lOlhiwoMi 


IN ILLINOIS 

(312) 498-1426 


SPECIAL! 

MULTItMATE 

WORD PERFECT 
$225.00 


CDW 0886 PC 


CIRCLE 305 ON READER SERVICE CARD 




















Index to advertisers 


RS # Advertisers Page 


233 ABKInc 377 

102 Able Intemstioiwl 101 

iOl ACS Computers 307 

106 AC^ International 209 

I S2 Advanced Logic Research 437 

499 Alliance Cop 227 

1% Alpha Software 133 

* Alps America 65-76 

* Alps America 77-78 

229 Alps America 178-179 

117 American Computers & 

P cri p hcnds 123 

S07 American Micro Technology ....444 

47S American Small Business 

Conqxitcrs 375 

1 74 Analytx International Inc 447 

* Arlington Conmter Products . . . 449 

275 Arthur Young Business Systems 392 

210 Ashlon-Tate 295 

AST Research. Inc 21^217 

* AST Research. Inc 303 

156 Ationics 153 

367 Banrtcr Blue 337 

150 Barrington Systems 231 

527 Bay Express 344 

116 BLOC bevelopmeni 400 

382 BOCA Research 331 

138 Borland International C2-C4, 1 

480 Bulldog Computer Products ...26-27 

* Business Computers of 

Peterho^gh 445 

472 Business Tools, Inc 37 

264 CambridgeSWCollaboralivc ...403 

160 Cauzin Systems 366 

155 Central Fbint Software Inc 414 


* CorrmaQ ComputerCtxp 268 

228 Corr^mAdd 22^225 

* CompuAdd 223-224 

226 ComfNiServe Info Service 279 

297 Computer Gassifteds Inc 394 

305 Computer Discount 

Warehouse 450 

no Computer Dynamics 127 

183 Computer Mail Order 412-413 

254 Con^ter Support Corp 188 

* Con^wter Support Corp 189-190 

1 59 Cotnpuicrvision 274-275 

125 Conroy-LaPoinie. Inc 36(^361 

315 Control Systems 162 

225 Core International 210 

218 Cosmosinc 285 

* Curtis Mfg. Co. Inc C^i 

120 Cygnet Tech 252 

149 DAC Software, Inc 17 

312 Data-Litc Systems 441 

* Data-Spec 407 

195 David Aldridge Co 182 

479 Decision Ware 104 

256 E)e]ia Technology 406 

496 Design Software 328 

285 DestCorp... 386 

240 Diconix ^9 

163 Dow Jones NewsTletrieval 385 


RS # Advertisers Page 


289 DysaiVXidcx 14 

270 Ecosoft .227 

336 Enertronks Research 184 

154 Everex Systems 144 

380 Express Systems 12-13 

295 Fim Generation 308 

1 80 Flagstaff Engineering 32 

105 Ford Software 266 

386 Foresight Resources Inc 58 

247 Fox&Geller 114 

250 FTG Data Systems 84 

173 G.A.S. International 63 

506 Generic Sc^tware 112 

266 GenTech 348 

239 Genoa Systems 183 

303 Hammcilab 399 

201 Haventrec Software Inc 91 

165 Hayes Miciocompulcr Prod 1 16 

260 H&E Computronics 452 

140 Hercules ComputcrTcchnology . 291 

484 Hewlen-Packaid 245 

482 Hewlett-Packaid 259 

170 Honeywell 92 

230 IBEX 414 

• IBM Entry Division 1 17-120 

158 IBMISG Division 233 

333 ireAssociatcs Inc 192-193 

334 ll^Associalcs Inc 194-195 

335 IDEAssoctalesInc 197 

337 IDEAssocialesinc 198-199 

360 Imperial Data Systems 336 

207 InfoCom 373 

206 Information Builders 301 

373 Innovative Software HKll 

511 Intel 166-167 

• ITT Info Systems 124 

• James River Group 340 

108 JDR Micro Devices 404 

342 K Software House 441 

113 Kalglo .407 

276 Kelly Industries 293 

• Lahey Comp. Syst 390 

271 Leading Edge 88 

400 Logicsofi 95-100 

199 Logictech 349 

389 Mansfield Software Group 402 

127 Matrox 109 

223 MBP 330 

478 Maynacd Electronics 39 

261 McGraw-Hill 56 

390 Megahertz Corp 411 

299 Microcom 90 

301 Micro Data Base Systems 389 

216 Microfocus 243 

202 Micromail 446 

• Microsoft 282-283 

• Microstar 251 

325 Microstufinc 30-31 

326 Mkrostuflnc 267 

388 Microsync Inc 407 

395 Microsync 345 

318 Microway Inc 82 

• Microway 28 

171 Minhab 234 


RS # Advertisers Page 


• Minority Hi-Tech Ind 396 

538 Mix Software 313 

3M MU Mkrosystems 407 

1 75 Multitcch Electronks 317 

178 NEC Home Electronics 40 

126 Northcasiem Software 48-49 

1 35 Northeastern Software 50 

115 Noriheasicm Software 47 

• Norton Utilities 411 

• Norton Utilities 342 

• Norton Utilities 384 

• NSI Logk 155 

177 Orchid Technology 121 

363 Oryx Systems 130 

• Pa^ise Systems 158-159 

• Paradise Systems 147 

350 PC American Marketing 440 

144 PC Brand 22-23 

124 PC Brand 21 

339 PC Connection 202-205 

• PC Cooling Systems 442 

372 PC Designs 43 

371 PC Designs 177 

194 PCHorizoasInc 414 

179 PC s Limited 138-139 

• PCsUmited 134-135 

• PC’sUmited 136-137 

535 PC Network 170-173 

• PCOnc 235 

• PCOne 236-237 

• PCOne 238 

145 PC Software Interest Group 24 

• PCSiarProd 391 

241 PC Wholesalers of Amer 351 

358 Peachtree Software 85 

121 ^nionSoftwarc 401 

491 Persoft 102 

489 Personal Computer Support 

Group 20 

490 Personal Computer Support Gr. . 105 

212 Personal Tex 392 

• Persysi 341 

282 Personics Corp 315 

379 Polaris 370-371 

141 Precision Data Products 392 

187 Primavera Systems. Inc 352 

316 Printronix 357 

185 Prognum Plus 415 

309 Pn^rcssive Micro 

IXstributors 115 

300 Prosoft 55 

242 ProTech 369 

512 Pubtk Domain Software 229 

189 Quadram 180 

190 Quadram 42 

• QuakJ Software 4 

391 Quantum SW Systems 106 

235 Qubk.. 125 

236 Qubk .. 127 

238 Qubk.. 129 

375 Quicksoft 365 

167 Racorc 362 

168 RcalWorklCotp C5 

1 29 Recreational Technology 319 


RS# Advertisers Page 


277 Red River Technology 219 

523 RIX Softvrorks Inc 247 

1 30 Rose Associ^es 356 

245 Santa Cruz Opcratkms 243 

470 SBT Corporation 53 

520 ServerTechnology 62 

347 Sigma Designs 149 

• Sigma Software 363 

370 Simon & Schuster 24 

128 Softcl 176 

230 Softexi Publishing 126 

• SofUine Corp 64 

288 Softlogk Solutions 80 

498 Softest Inc 447 

530 Sftftware Bottling 

Company 281 

• Software Directions Ill 

394 Software Link. Inc 322 

• Software Link. Inc 248 

393 Software Link. Inc 41 

392 Software Link. Inc 249 

487 Software Masters 181 

488 Software Masters 106 

298 Software Publ M7 

193 Software Solutions 79 

497 Spcctrom Software 410 

• SPI J64 

172 SPSS Inc 94 

517 STB Systems 57 

244 STSCInc 215 

• Symantec 262-263 

• Sysgen 110 

“ Systems Mgmi 132 

181 Tatung 289 

532 TDA.lnc 229 

504 Tech PC 338-339 

505 Tech PC 33^333 

501 Tech PC 334-335 

220 Tckicaming Systems Inc 397 

206 Tcicmart 128-129 

346 Telcvideo 29 

324 Texas Computer Systems 19 

222 T/Makcr Graphics 107 

366 Topaz 299 

307 Torus Systtnes Inc 257 

203 Toshiba 93 

204 Toshiba 166-167 

119 Tseng Lab Inc 81 

214 Univation 381 

191 Var-Econometrk 229 

364 Vcn-Tcl Inc 16 

• Verbatim 393 

310 Video-7 Inc 163 

132 Walonkk Assoc 227 

• Warchoasc Data 

Produas 379 

515 WellsAmencan 5 

153 Westlake Data 326 

157 Westlake Data 347 

513 Word Perfect Corp 122 

518 XYQuest 383 


* — No Reader Servxc ^ Please call advenner tor 
infntnatinn 


PC MAGAZINE ADVERTISING SALES STAFF 

Advertising C(K>rdinator . . . Jeanne WoodliK'k 

1 Park Avenue. New York . NY 1 00 1 6 (2 1 2) 503-5 1 00 


MA,NH, VTMF^RLCT 
District Manager 
160 Slate Street 
Boston. M A 02109 
(617)367-7190 

John Bucknavage • Account Representative 
(212)503-5100 

DE, MD. DC, VA, Wy NC, SC. AU 

MS,TN,AR, KY.nyGA 

Borinie Breslauer • District Manager 

5901 Peachtree Dunwoody Road-^uile 500 

Atlanta. GA 30328 

(404)394-0590 

Lauren Morse • Account Representative 
(212)503-5100 


NY.NJ,n\ 

Janet Ryan - District Manager 
(212) 503-5307 

Ken Horn - Account Representative 

1 Park Avenue 

New York. NY 10016 

(212)503-5128 

NE,WI, IL,I\MN.MO, 

OH, Ml, lA. ND, SD, Canada 
John Hemsath - DisUici Manager 
BO N. Mkhigan Avenue Suite 1400 
Chicago, I L 60601 
(312)346-2600 

Jim Stafford - Account Representative 
(212)503-5100 

Jeff Miller - Western Advertising Director 


CA (San Francisco & North), OR. WA 
Dave Riegler - District Manager 
II Davis Drive 
Belmont. CA 94002 
(415)598-2341 

Lauren Morse - Account Representative 
(212)503-5100 

CA (Santa Barbara to So. San 
Francisco), CO, ID. MT, AK, NV HI 
Gini Talmadgc - District Manager 
Charisse Smith - Account Representative 
1 Park Avenue 
NewYoik.NY 10016 
(212)503-5100 


CA (LA, San Diego & Orange 
County), AZ 

Debra Huisken - District Manager 
1601 Dove Street Suite 240 
Newport Beach , CA 92660 
(714)476-0749 

Steve Lincoln • Account Represcnlalivc 
3460WiIshire Blvd. 

Los Angeles. CA 90010 
(213)387-2100 

TX.OK, LA, KS. UT,NM 
Jennifer Bartel • District Manager 
5956 Sherry LaiK Suite 1330 
Dallas. TX 75225 (214) 691-6934 
Joanna Broome - Account Representative 
(212)503-5100 


PC MAGAZINE ■ AUGUST 1986 
451 




OVER 

100.000 SOLO 


^ The VersaBusiness'*' Series 

Gidi VesxBuncci modufe c«»te purdBaUnd uwd tndependemty. or can be imked in 
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aqriMianiisonnre. 

VBBAREC8VABLES- SM.IS 

ii I oompiela mwu-enwn accounts rweMM». 
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gjibw lii >Wi»ii II ■ I \* III intnitninnrrmiril in 

I uwji )iciu 01 ywf company money 

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keep tacLat aa oj ffwt md ayd 
ing tedttetHinn iH MormaMa 
mucn nffiy your company owes 
t your cash floe. 

$ 99.99 

I tuBy auton u W pay roll ystem 



I ON Keeps track of it 
qosv trifomaew. asantv 
calceietei payiM de rfieM or u fin euery-sMi) and 
prtna diedtt aediemed tem 
VBOMNVBrrORY'* 199.96 

IS an instant accMNimMiefy-pfOSfam that oivet 
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REVIEWS: 

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Accounting 

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RealWoiid Corporation 
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Hardware 


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The Experts in Accessories 


MacxifKlurtng Comfk 

OTTl 





L 

I 




Parallel 
Printer Cable: 

Retail. S29.95 


IBM, PC. PCXT Syitem Stand: 

Retail. .$24.96 . ' 


Safe-Strip 
Surge Pretaetor, 

Retail.. $29.95 




91*^ Command 
Center: Controls 
Up to 5 Rsripherals, 
Retail.. $129.95 


Serial Modem 
Cable: 

Retail. $29.96 


'Rwelve Easy Pieces 

Whether you need to get more comfortable, want guaranteed protection for your 
hardware and sofWare, or need a system layout that's personalized to your 
requirements, Curtis makes it easy. After all, we're Curtis— the experts in accessories. 


Curtis products are available nationally from leading Dealers, Distributors, and Retail Chains, 
In Canada: Micro.ComRuter Products, PC. Box 235, Ajax, ONT, Canada LIS 3C3, 1416) 427-6612 

For the Curtis dealer nearest you coll (603) 924-3823 

ManutacturtriB Cowparry. Inc. 

CURTIS 

305 Union Street, Fteterborough, NH 03468 


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